
Class __LaM-_ 
Book_.JjiAk 
Copyright N° 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



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'in I" i:k\!!\isck\ck.s 



.lAMKS lUKUll.I. ANCI.l.L 



THE 

EEMINISCENCES 

OF 

JAMES BURRILL ANGELL 



LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 

FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK 

LONDON, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA 

1912 






COPYRIGHT. 1911, BY 
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 



THE • PLIMPTON • PRESS 

[ W D • O ] 
NORWOOD • MASS • U • S • A 

(S)CI.A3{i:367G 






PREFACE 

Many of my friends can bear witness 
that it is not without a certain reluctance 
that I have prepared this volume of Rem- 
iniscences for publication. I have done it 
under the pressure of frequent and urgent 
requests from colleagues in the Faculties, 
and from students of the three Universities, 
with which I have been officially connected. 
They have thought that msmy of the facts 
which I have described in my narrative are 
worthy of being recorded in a permanent 
form. 

I venture to hope that the narrative may 
prove of interest to them. I can assure 
them, however, that autobiography compels 
one to write so largely of one's self that it 
involves the serious discomfort of a seeming 
lack of modesty. But that discomfort will 
be cheerfully borne by the writer, if this 
volume shall help to keep him in touch 
with the colleagues and students w^hose 
friendship has brought so much joy into 
his life. 



University of Michigan, 
July 1, 1911. 



[v] 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

From Birth to Graduation. 1829-1849 . . 1 

The Southern Journey 41 

Civil Engineering and Study in Europe . . 77 

Professorship in Brown University . . . 105 

Presidency of the University of Vermont . 121 

The Mission to China 128 

The Canadian Fisheries Commission . . . 169 

Summer Trips to Europe 180 

Mission to Ottoman Empire 188 

Presidency of the University of Michigan . 225 



[vii] 



EEMINISCENCES OF 
JAMES B. ANGELL 

I 

FROM BIRTH TO GRADUATION 

1829-1849 

I WAS born in Scituate, Rhode Island, 
on January 7, 1829. My parents were 
Andrew Aldrich Angell and Amy Aldrich 
Angell. They were remotely related. I 
am the oldest of eight children, two of 
whom died in infancy. I am the lineal 
descendant, of the seventh generation, from 
Thomas Angell who, an EngKshman by 
birth, came, in 1631, to Massachusetts 
with Roger Wilhams, and, in 1636, accom- 
panied WiUiams when the latter settled on 
the spot to which he gave the name of Provi- 
dence. Thomas Angell was one of the 
signers of the noted compact ^ to which 

iThis is the Compact. "We whose names are here- 
under written, being desirous to inhabit in the town of 
Providence, do promise to submit ourselves in active or 
passive obedience, to all such orders or agreements as 
shall be made for public good of the body, in an orderly 
way, by the major consent of the present inhabitants, 
masters of families incorporated together into a township, 
and such others whom they shall admit into the ^ame, 
only in civil things." Signed by thirteen persons. 

[1] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Rhode Islanders have always looked back 
with pride, as the first instrument of pure 
democracy, which leaves absolute freedom 
in matters of religious concern. 

In 1675, as is learned from the Provi- 
dence Early Records, lands on the west 
side of the so-called Seven Mile Line were 
assigned to several men. Among them was 
Thomas Angell. His grandson and name- 
sake, Thomas, appears to have settled in 
1710 on the farm on which I was born. 

The town was incorporated in 1731. 
Why the name Scituate was given to it is 
not clear. It has been thought by some it 
was because it was partly settled by emi- 
grants from Scituate, Massachusetts. But 
I have never heard of but one settler from 
that place. We know that the Massachu- 
setts antiquarians believe that the name is 
Indian, being written Setuat, or nearly in 
that form, and signifying Cold Brooks. ^ 
It is not improbable that the site of the 
town in Rhode Island bore a similar Indian 
name, and was anglicized like that in 
Massachusetts by the form Scituate. 

The land, or a portion of it, on which 
Thomas settled, was held and occupied 
continuously by his descendants until after 
the death of my father in 1864. Repre- 

1 " Mass. Hist. Coll.," Second Series, Vol. 4, p. 223. 

[2] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

sentatives of the Angell family are numerous 
in Rhode Island, where in the main they 
have remained. They have been found 
chiefly in the ranks of plain farmers, me- 
chanics and tradesmen, gaining by industry 
and integrity an honest living, but win- 
ning no particular distinction. Those best 
known, perhaps, are Col. Israel Angell, who 
commanded in a creditable manner a regi- 
ment in the Revolution, and Joseph Kinni- 
cutt Angell, whose books on law gave him 
some eminence in the last generation. 
Nearly always some of them have been 
found in the State Legislature. 

My immediate ancestors, like many of the 
farmers of former days who lived on some 
important thoroughfare, combined the busi- 
ness of tavern-keeping with that of farming. 
At an early day the Providence and Nor- 
wich Turnpike Company, whose road passed 
through our farm, was chartered. The 
farmers of several towns in eastern Con- 
necticut then marketed their products in 
Providence and so travelled the turnpike 
road. During the War of 1812, much of 
the travel and transportation by land be- 
tween Boston and New York went by this 
route. Good inns were therefore needed. 
Through the period of my boyhood the 
number of travellers who sought accom- 

[3] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

modations in the spacious house which my 
grandfather erected in 1810, was very con- 
siderable. In earher days, the town meet- 
ings were held at the tavern. In my own 
time, the military gatherings — the " General 
Trainings " — were held in the intervales 
near by; political meetings, occasionally a 
justice's court, were held in a large hall 
which formed a part of the house. Com- 
pared with the seclusion of the ordinary 
farmer's boy's life, it will readily be seen 
that life here was very stirring. I have 
always felt that the knowledge of men I 
gained by the observations and experiences 
of my boyhood in the country tavern has 
been of the greatest service. Human nature 
could be studied in every variety, from that 
of the common farm labourer to travellers 
of the highest breeding and refinement. The 
eminent political speakers were always en- 
tertained at our table, and some of them 
were very helpful friends in my later life. 
If, as I have sometimes been assured, I have 
any power of adaptation to the society of 
different classes of men, I owe it in no 
small degree to these varied associations of 
my boyhood. 

I began my education by learning my 
alphabet from an old law book. My grand- 
father had been Justice of the Peace, and 

[4] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

therefore had this volume, each chapter of 
which began with a very large capital letter. 
Under the guidance of my uncle, I learned 
these letters. That fact is my earliest 
recollection. I recall with especial dis- 
tinctness the large J, as I was made to 
understand that it was the initial of my 
name. 

I may remark in passing that my name 
was given me by my step-grandfather, who 
was an admirer of James Burrill,^ an early 
United States Senator from Rhode Island. 

At a very early age (I know not how 
early), I was sent to the District School. I 
remember that I was so young that my 
father used frequently to take me to school 
on horseback in front of him on the saddle. 
A large boy of the neighbourhood w^as hired 
to take charge of me on the road when I 
walked. The district school was then in a 
very primitive state. A sloping board at- 
tached to the wall quite around the room 
was the writing desk for all the larger 
pupils. They sat on benches with their 
backs towards the middle of the room. 
The small scholars sat on low benches in 
the centre of the room. Those who wrote 

iHe was the grandfather of George William Curtis 
and Rev. James Burrill Curtis. Hence George Curtis 
used playfully to call me his cousin. 

[5] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

made their own writing books. They pur- 
chased unruled paper, cut it into leaves, 
stitched them together, put a rough brown 
paper cover on, and ruled the lines with a 
leaden plummet. The first duty in the 
morning was to mend the goose-quill pens, 
and in the winter to thaw the ink on the 
stove. The highest branch was Daboll's 
Arithmetic, and the older pupils who had 
completed it one winter came back the 
next and "ciphered through it" again. 
Reading, spelling, writing, a little grammar, 
elementary geography, and arithmetic, fur- 
nished the whole curriculum. 

Fortunately for me, when I was about 
eight years of age a Quaker, Isaac Fiske, 
came to the neighbourhood, and established 
a school for boarders and for day scholars, 
and I was placed under his care. He was a 
most thorough, painstaking, and exacting 
teacher. He had little class-work. His 
instruction was personal. He went round 
from pupil to pupil to render needed assist- 
ance in solving mathematical problems. 
When we had completed them he required 
us to copy our work neatly into manuscript 
books. I remained with him four years, 
and not only completed arithmetic, but 
studied surveying also. As he did not 
teach foreign languages, ancient or modern, 

[6] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

he advised my parents to place me in some 
school where I might study Latin. But, 
for the thoroughness of his instruction I 
have always felt under deep obligations to 

him. 

Some boys whom I knew were attending a 
seminary in Seekonk, Massachusetts, about 
three miles from Providence, and urged me 
to come there. It was a great trial to my 
mother to have me leave home ; but it was 
decided that I ought to go. I was then 
twelve years old. On arriving at the school, 
I found that in arithmetic I was far ahead 
of the boys of my age, and so it was 
wisely concluded that I should give my 
whole time to Latin. And this experiment 
of intensive study, carried on in a rational 
way, had a very interesting result. The 
principal put me in charge of his sister, a 
very intelligent woman. He had been drill- 
ing a class of older boys two years on the 
dry rules of Latin grammar, without letting 
them read much Latin. The sister gave me 
a small book containing the paradigms and 
easy reading lessons. I met her twice a 
day, finished the book, and by the end of 
the three months' term was able to join 
the class of older boys in such reading as 
was then set for them, and to go on with 
them without difficulty. 

[7] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

After I had spent one term at this 
school, my parents decided to send me 
to the Smithville Seminary, an Academy 
which the Freewill Baptists had estab- 
lished in the northern part of my own 
town, only five miles from my home. 

The two principal instructors. Rev. Hosea 
Quinby, a graduate of Waterville College, 
Maine, and Mr. S. L. Weld, a graduate of 
Brown University, were familiar with the 
traditional methods of the New England 
Academy. Without being eminent scholars, 
they had the faculty of interesting, and to a 
fair degree of stimulating, their pupils. 
Most of these were farmers' sons and 
daughters who wished to supplement the 
limited work of the district schools. A 
small number were preparing themselves 
for college. I joined them in their classes 
with no such purpose distinctly formed. I 
also took nearly all the scientific instruc- 
tion which was given, and given as well as 
it could be without laboratories or much 
apparatus. Many of the students were 
men in years. They were diligent students. 
Some of them were awkward and rustic in 
manners, but they were thoroughl^^ earnest 
and gave a good tone to the school. 

The best instruction, and that was the 
case in such schools generally, was in mathe- 

[8] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

matics. I pushed on through algebra and 
plane and solid geometry. English was 
taught by the stupid method of parsing 
"Pope's Essay on Man" and that dolorous 
book, *' Pollock's Course of Time." The 
ideals of writing and speaking which were 
in vogue were greatly wanting in simplicity 
and directness. The instruction in the 
classics, while it would not now be regarded 
as sufficiently critical, encouraged and en- 
abled us to read rapidly enough to get real 
enjoyment from the author. We soon 
caught the swing and the flow of the Vir- 
gihan verse, so that we read with genuine 
delight in the last six books of the iEneid 
at the rate of three hundred lines a day. 
The poem was not made a mere frame-work 
on which to hang puzzhng questions in 
grammar, but read as a poem which we were 
to enjoy as we did Scott's ''Marmion" or 
the '' Lady of the Lake." That method may 
be deemed old-fashioned by modern doctors 
of philosophy ; but I have always been very 
grateful that under that method my first 
acquaintance with Virgil was not dull task- 
work, but the source of constant delight. 

As I look back on the work done in the 
dead or moribund academies of New Eng- 
land which have been supplanted by the 
well-appointed high school, I am convinced 

[9] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

that, with their many defects, due in large 
part to inadequate means, they rendered 
a most valuable service. They prepared 
teachers for the district schools, young men 
for business, and a limited number to meet 
the moderate requirements which were 
asked in that time for admission to college. 
We are in danger of underrating the value 
of their work. 

While during my fourteenth year I was 
at school at the Academy, Mr. O. S. Fowler, 
a somewhat noted phrenologist of that day, 
gave some lectures in the village of North 
Scituate and made a professional "exami- 
nation" of my head. I still have his writ- 
ten report on me. It was ridiculous in its 
exaggerated estimate of my gifts, but it 
had one good result. He persuaded my 
relatives and friends that by study I was 
overtaxing my strength, and that I ought 
to leave school for a time and lead a vigor- 
ous out-of-door life. While I was by no 
means ill, I have little doubt that I owe in 
some degree the physical vigour with which 
I have been blessed all my life to the fact 
that owing to his counsel I spent the next 
two seasons, from early spring till late 
autumn, at work upon my father's farm, 
side by side with his hired men, hoeing my 
row and mowing my swath and learning 

[10] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

all the details of farm work. Much of this 
I had previously learned in vacations; but 
I now learned thoroughly how much back- 
ache a dollar earned in the fields repre- 
sented. I was also enabled to see how the 
world looks from the point of view of the 
labouring man. Often in later years, when 
weary with study, I was inspired with new 
zeal by recalling how much severer were 
the fatigue and monotony of the work of 
the farmer's boy. It is a good fortune for 
a boy to have known by experience what 
hard and continuous manual labour means. 
The life in my native town during the 
years of my boyhood was much like that in 
the other rural towns of Rhode Island. It 
was very simple and frugal. The popula- 
tion was of pure English descent. I think 
my father within the period of my recollec- 
tion brought the first Irish maid-servant 
into the town. Farming was the chief 
occupation. There were half-a-dozen cot- 
ton factories of moderate size scattered 
through the town; but the operatives were 
drawn from the farms and were all Ameri- 
cans. The farmers got their limited supply 
of money from the sale chiefly of wood, char- 
coal, and potatoes, in Providence, and of 
milk and butter to the operatives in the 
mills. Some added to their income by 

[11] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

turning bobbins and spools in the winter 
in small shops erected on little streams upon 
their farms. They found a ready market 
for their products in the cotton factories 
through the State. The practice of the 
greatest economy was necessary to make a 
small farm support a family. In 1840 the 
census-taker permitted me to accompany 
him in his gig over a large part of the town. 
I think we entered only two or three houses 
which had aTry other carpets or rugs than 
those which the occupants had made from 
rags. I believe that there were not more 
than two pianos in the town. There was 
no public library; there were very few 
books in private libraries. Although the 
town was only twelve miles from Brown 
University, I was the first boy from Scitu- 
ate to graduate from the college. But 
there had always been in the town some men 
of prominence in public affairs. Stephen 
Hopkins, the signer of the Declaration of 
Independence, lived there. In my own 
time, one governor of the State and one 
lieutenant-governor resided there; but 
the great mass of the inhabitants were 
hard-working farmers, who led toilsome, 
honest lives, and left little to .their children 
beyond the inheritance they had received 
from their parents. If the children were 

[12] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

now willing to practise the same industry 
and frugality they could live with equal 
comfort upon the farms. But they are 
rapidly selling them to the Irish and the 
French, who are willing to practise even 
greater economy than the fathers did two 
generations back, and so are hving in com- 
parative thrift. The change in the type of 
population is marked, as it is in most of 
the rural towns of New England, perhaps 
even more so, since the operatives in the 
factories are now almost all of foreign 
birth. 

The amusements of the country folk were 
few and simple. Perhaps the most gen- 
erally attractive was the annual visit to 
the shore of Narragansett Bay, usually at 
a place called the Buttonwoods, where, 
under the shade of some sycamore trees, 
they made a clambake after the manner 
of the Indians. They first gathered the 
clams from the sand laid bare by the reced- 
ing tide or the quahog from the adjacent 
waters. They built a fire on stones and 
heated them thoroughly; and then placing 
the shell-fish and potatoes and ears of corn 
on the stones they covered the whole with 
sea-weed, and the cooking was slowly done. 
While the roasting was going on, a bath in 
the sea was enjoyed by all who wished it. 

[13] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

The clam or quahog, held in the hand, was 
dipped in a cup of melted butter and eaten 
with a relish which no participant in one of 
those out-of-door feasts will ever forget. 

Every farmer was expected to take his 
family and his hired men "to the shore" 
at least once, when the haying season was 
over. At the time of the August full moon 
the roads were well filled with these pilgrims 
to the sea. Occasionally a party of neigh- 
bours, numbering fifteen or twenty, hired a 
large sail boat at Apponaug or East Green- 
wich, and after the clambake sailed down the 
bay to Hope Island, spent the night there, 
and rose at dawn to fish. Occasionally the 
dullness of the winter was enlivened by a 
ball at some one of the taverns in the town; 
but the life was upon the whole monoto- 
nous, and constant toil was relieved by few 
amusements. 

Probably, owing to the reaction among 
the early settlers of Rhode Island from the 
Puritanical spirit of their neighbours in 
Massachusetts and Connecticut, Sunday 
was not generally kept as it was in those 
States. It was the day for visiting rela- 
tives and friends and largely for fishing and 
hunting and ball-playing. It may truth- 
fully be said that the factory operatives had 
no other time for visiting or for pleasure. 

[14] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

The most numerous religious bodies in our 
part of the State were the Six Principle 
Baptists and the Freewill Baptists. The 
preachers of the former denomination were 
all men of limited education; so were most 
of the preachers of the latter. Naturally 
enough, the men of the most intelligence 
and influence rarely attended church, and 
the spiritual life of the town was at a 
rather low ebb. But the general standard 
of morals would compare well with that of 
the present day. Drunkenness and gam- 
bling were not prevalent. A man sup- 
posed to be addicted to gambling or to 
licentiousness could not retain the public 
esteem. Political life was purer than it has 
been of late years in the State. 

The language of the people retained some 
peculiar expressions which must have come 
from England, and which I have heard 
rarely or not at all in other parts of our 
country. Thus after a wedding it was cus- 
tomary for the parents of the bride to give 
a party. That party was always spoken of 
as the onfare. Whether that is the proper 
spelhng I cannot say, as I never saw it in 
print. It would seem to come from the 
word fare in the sense to travel. The occa- 
sion was, therefore, a sort of God-speed, to 
send the married couple faring on their way. 

[15] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Again, if a candidate for office was going 
about, buttonholing men and soliciting 
support, he was said to be "parmateering." 
It has occurred to me that that word might 
be an abbreviation of Parliamenteering, if 
that form was ever used to signify going 
about seeking support for parliament. An 
auction was generally spoken of as a 
vendue, pronounced vandue. That word 
borrowed from the French was used in 
England. 

Up to the time I left the Academy I had 
no fixed plan for life. My teachers had en- 
couraged me to believe that I could succeed 
in college studies. But, although at the 
age of fourteen I had covered more ground, 
especially in Latin and mathematics, than 
was required for admission to any of the 
New England colleges, I had no definite 
purpose of going to college. During the 
summers I was at home on the farm. I 
made some unsuccessful efforts to secure a 
clerkship in business establishments in 
Providence; but in my fifteenth year it 
was clear that I ought to decide what 
career I should endeavour to follow. Mv 
father informed me that he was able and 
willing to send me to college, but in that 
case would hardly be able, in justice to my 
five brothers and sisters, to aid me further. 

[16] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

It was left to me to say whether I should 
go. I was certain that it would gratify 
both him and my mother if I chose to take 
the college life, and so the die was cast. 

Conscious that in my somewhat pro- 
longed absence from school my knowledge 
of the classics had become rather rusty, and 
being still a year below the age set for 
entering Brown University, I spent the 
larger part of a school year in the Univer- 
sity Grammar School in Providence. It 
was then conducted by Mr. Merrick Lyon 
and Mr. Henry S. Frieze, afterwards the 
distinguished Professor of Latin in the Uni- 
versity of Michigan. My studies were 
mainly in the classes of the latter. Contact 
with this inspiring teacher formed an epoch 
in my intellectual life, as in that of so many 
other boys. He represented the best type 
of the modern teacher, at once critical as a 
grammarian and stimulating with the finest 
appreciation of whatever was choicest in the 
classic masterpieces. At first, as we were 
show^ered with questions such as I had never 
heard before, it seemed to me, although the 
reading of the Latin was mainly a review 
to me, that I should never emerge from my 
state of ignorance. But there was such a 
glow of enthusiasm in the instructor and 
in the class, there was such delight in the 
3 [17] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

tension in which we were kept by the daily 
exercises, that no task seemed too great to 
be encountered. Though in conjunction 
with our reading we devoured the Latin 
grammar so that by the end of the year 
we could repeat almost the whole of it, 
paradigms, rules, and exceptions without 
prompting, the work of mastering it did not 
seem dry and onerous, for we now felt how 
the increasing accuracy of our knowledge 
of the structure of the language enhanced 
our enjoyment of the Virgil and the Cicero, 
whose subtle and less obvious charms we 
were aided by our teacher to appreciate. 

I here interrupt the sketch of my educa- 
tion in school to speak of an important 
event in 1842, which awakened a deep and 
a permanent interest in me in political and 
constitutional questions: I refer to what 
is known in Rhode Island history as the 
Dorr war. 

Rhode Island retained the very liberal 
charter she had received from Charles II 
as her Constitution down to 1843. Under 
that Constitution the right of suffrage was 
limited to the owners of land of the value 
of at least one hundred and thirty -four dol- 
lars and to the oldest sons of such land- 
holders. So long as the people of the State 
were engaged mainly in farming, in com- 

[18] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

merce and in whale fishing, there was no 
serious discontent with this hmitation of the 
suffrage. But after the War of 1812, manu- 
facturing, especially the manufacture of 
cotton, grew up rapidly in the State. By 
1840 the operatives and the mechanics in 
the State, who had no right to vote, were 
a numerous body. Naturally enough they 
sought an amendment to the Constitution 
which would permit them to have a voice 
in choosing their rulers; but they sought 
in vain. There, as everywhere, the exclu- 
sive possessors of power preferred to retain 
it. Therefore the petitioners, seeing no 
possibility of securing an amendment to the 
constitution in accordance with the method 
provided by it, called a convention to frame 
such a constitution as they desired, nomi- 
nated officers to be voted for at the same 
time the constitution was submitted to be 
adopted or rejected by those on whom this 
new constitution conferred the privilege of 
suffrage. The supporters of the State gov- 
ernment mainly absented themselves from 
the polls. The new constitution was de- 
clared by its friends to be adopted. Thomas 
W. Dorr, a most worthy and capable man, 
belonging to one of the most respectable 
families of Providence, was said to be elected 
governor. He at once laid claim to the 

[19] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

office and demanded possession of the State 
property. Then his subordinate officers 
attempted to take possession. Governor 
King resisted, and so an armed conflict 
came on. Those who supported the regu- 
lar State authorities were known as the Law 
and Order Party, and the opponents as the 
Dorrites. 

I am not to recite the detailed history of 
the strife, which resulted in the defeat of 
the Dorrites and in the trial, conviction, and 
imprisonment of Mr. Dorr on the charge 
of treason. It also led the victors to 
see that the time had come for enlarging 
the suffrage. They made a new and more 
liberal constitution, under which by the 
payment of a small registry or poll tax the 
suffrage was opened to all citizens of Ameri- 
can birth. 

But the issue which was raised by the 
original contest was one of great constitu- 
tional interest and importance and was 
made so plain that we schoolboys could 
comprehend it clearly enough to discuss it 
in our essays and debates in school, though 
I believe great constitutional lawyers are 
not yet fully agreed upon the decision of 
the fundamental question involved. The 
question is whether the citizens of a State 
have a right to call a convention and adopt 

[20] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

a constitution by any other method than 
that prescribed in the Constitution already 
in force. This was, of course, decided in 
the negative in Rhode Island. 

The feeling of opposition between the two 
parties in the state was almost as acute as 
that between the Union men and the Con- 
federates in the Border States during the 
Civil War. My father was a Law and Or- 
der man, and a member of the Legislature 
during the troubles. The people who lived 
near us in the adjoining factory village 
were all Dorrites. They gave us to under- 
stand that they would not aid us to ex- 
tinguish the flames if our house took fire. 
We happened to be building a large addition 
to our kitchen that year. They dubbed it 
the Algerine kitchen, as their favourite name 
for their opponents was Algerines, because 
of the alleged cruelty of the State officials 
towards the prisoners they took. The 
family adopted the name for the kitchen, 
and it was known as '*the Algerine" so 
long as the house stood. As in the South 
after the Civil War, the women retained 
their animosities much longer than the men. 
The Dorr War affected permanently the 
political division of men in the State. The 
Democrats in other States generally sym- 
pathized with Mr. Dorr. Therefore most 

[21] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of the Rhode Island Democrats (of whom 
my father was one) who opposed him, and 
they were numerous, subsequently acted 
with the Whig party during the remaining 
years of the existence of that party. I 
therefore grew up with an inherited attach- 
ment to the Whigs, save that like most of 
the Brown University students I was led 
by President Wayland's instructions to 
doubt the wisdom or justice of protective 
tariffs. 

My college life covered the period from 
1845 to 1849. In these days, when the 
faculty numbers nearly a hundred, it is 
difficult to comprehend how a faculty of 
seven men carried on the institution with 
vigour and success. I need hardly say that 
each one of the seven was a man of force 
and was admirably qualified for his special 
work. 

The youngest was Professor Lincoln. He 
had recently returned from Germany, where 
he had pursued extended studies in the 
classics and in philosophy. We had the 
pleasure of reading Livy with him while 
he was preparing his edition of that author. 
He was, therefore, brimful of enthusiasm on 
the subject and fired us with much of his 
own spirit. Although we were studying a 
dead language, no classroom was more 

[22] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

alive than this. He was intolerant of 
sluggishness or laziness, and often rebuked 
it with a stinging word. *'I have for- 
gotten," said an indolent fellow one day in 
reply to a question. '* Forgotten," was the 
sharp retort of the teacher, "did you ever 
know.^" One answer given him amused 
him and the class as affording rich material 
for his notes on Livy. We were reading 
the twenty-first chapter, which describes 
the passage of the Alps by Hannibal. The 
professor asked one of the class why Hanni- 
bal had the elephants with him. With 
great promptness the answer came, '*to 
draw up his cannon." The youth who 
made the reply was so chaffed by his class- 
mates that he left Brown and went to 
another college. 

Professor Boise, who afterwards at the 
University of Michigan and the Chicago 
Theological Seminary won so high a repu- 
tation, had charge of the Greek. He mani- 
fested the same philological acumen which 
always distinguished him. But he seemed 
to us at that time to dwell too much on the 
minutiae of grammar, and not enough on the 
beauties of Greek literature. The current 
saying among us was that *'he would die 
for an enclitic." But it is impossible to 
overstate the influence which he and his 

[23] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

colleague, Professor Frieze, exerted in the 
West through their labours at the Uni- 
versity of Michigan in diffusing love for 
the stud}^ of the ancient classics. 

The librarian, Professor Charles C. 
Jewett, who had been in Europe purchas- 
ing books for the library, had charge of the 
instruction in French in my sophomore 
year. He was greatly beloved by the stu- 
dents. It was with much regret that we 
saw him accept the post of librarian of the 
Smithsonian Institution. He afterwards be- 
came the librarian of the Boston Public 
Library, and died at a comparatively early 
age. 

Fortunately his place in the classroom 
was taken by George W. Greene, the well- 
known historical scholar. His life had been 
chiefly spent in Europe. The revolutions 
of 1848 were raging while we were under 
him. Greatly to our delight, and I may 
add to our profit, his time in the classroom, 
under the provocation of questions from 
us, was chiefly spent in discussing European 
affairs, and especially in describing the 
eminent persons who were conducting the 
military or political movements. Not a 
few of these he knew personally. None of 
us, who hung upon his lips in these hours, 
can ever forget his narratives. He had the 

[24] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

art of the best French raconteur, I confess 
that my own intense interest in European 
poHtics and history dates from the hours I 
sat under the spell of George Greene's fine 
talk. And who of our American wTiters 
has surx)assed him in a pure and flowing 
English style? I am sure the inspiration of 
the contact with so finished a scholar was 
lost on but few of the class, even though 
the demands for the details of recitation 
were not very exacting. 

Professor Gammell had charge of our 
writing and speaking and also of the work 
in history. lie maintained the tradition of 
pure and chaste writing which, established 
under Professor Goddard, has, I am happy 
to believe, never been lost at Brown. He 
was most exacting in his demands upon the 
writers, and no one willingly subjected him- 
self to the humour and the stings of his 
pungent criticism. Even those who could 
not at the time receive them with compla- 
cency lived to recognize in them with grati- 
tude "the wounds of a friend." No teacher 
rejoiced more than he in the success of his 
students in life or v»^atched their careers 
with more interest. His course in history 
was fuller than that at any other college 
except Harvard. It w^as chiefly devoted 
to English constitutional history, though 

[25] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

some time was given to American consti- 
tutional history. It called for solid and 
fruitful work. 

According to the custom of those days in 
all the colleges, one man was called to give 
instruction in several sciences. This man 
was Professor Chace. He taught chemis- 
try, geology, botany, and physiology. At 
times he also conducted classes in Butler's 
Analogy. He really ought to have been 
assigned to the teaching of philosophy. His 
natural bent was towards metaphysics. 
His mind was singularly acute, his mental 
processes were most logical; his style of 
expression was absolutely lucid. His in- 
struction was, therefore, highly appreciated, 
though from the brevity of the courses he 
could give us only elementary instruction 
in science. Laboratories had not then been 
introduced anywhere in this country. His 
opinion on any subject carried great weight 
with the students. It was generally be- 
lieved that no one could outwit him by 
any trick or device. Therefore the vain 
attempt was seldom made. 

Professor Caswell, who gave instruction 
in mathematics, astronomy, and natural 
philosophy, had of all the teachers the 
strongest hold on the affections of the stu- 
dents. To him every one who needed 

[26] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

sympathy or counsel instinctively went. 
His great warm heart drew all to him. He 
had the gift of making mathematics attract- 
ive to most students, and even tolerable 
to that inconsiderable number who had no 
gift or no taste for the study. When the 
vote on recommending for degrees was to 
be taken, he looked with abundant charity 
on those who had never been able to pass 
the examinations in mathematics, saying 
amiably, "Let them pass. The conies are 
a feeble folk." The impress of his beauti- 
ful character upon all the students was never 
forgotten or entirely effaced. 

President Wayland taught us intellectual 
and moral philosophy, pohtical economy, 
and (in a brief course) the evidences of 
Christianity. I have met not a few of the 
men whom the world has called great; but 
I have seldom met a man who so impressed 
me with the weight of his personality as did 
Dr. Wayland. After making due allow- 
ance for the fact that I was but a youth 
when I sat under his teaching, I still think 
that by his power of intellect, of will, and 
of character, he deserved to be ranked with 
the strongest men our country has pro- 
duced. It may be said of him as of his 
friend, Mark Hopkins, that his published 
writings do not adequately represent the 

[27] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

man as his pupils knew him. As a teacher 
he was unsurpassed. His power of analyz- 
ing a subject into its simple elements and 
his power of happy illustration, often 
humorous, were equally marked. One- 
fourth of my classmates were Southerners. 
When we came to the subject of slavery in 
our study of moral philosophy, we discussed 
it for three weeks. The robust personality 
of Dr. Wayland was felt throughout the 
whole life of the institution. The discipline 
which was administered exclusively by him 
was unnecessarily rigorous, the standard 
of scholarship was high, the intellectual 
demands upon the students were exacting. 
For those who attained high rank the life 
was a strenuous one. The method pur- 
sued was specially calculated to cultivate 
the powers of analysis and memory. Where- 
ever the subject permitted of such treat- 
ment, we were always required to begin 
the recitation by giving an analysis of the 
discussion in the text-book or the lecture. 
We were then expected to take up point 
after point of the lesson and recite w^ithout 
being aided by questions from the teacher. 
There was a general belief among the stu- 
dents, though no formal statement to that 
effect was made by the Faculty, that they 
would gain higher credit by repeating the 

[28] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

language of the book than by reporting the 
substance of the thought in their own lan- 
guage. By dint of continued memorizing, 
some of the students attained to a remark- 
able development of the verbal memory. 
I think that nearly one-fourth of the men 
in my class in their senior year used to 
learn in two hours — and that after an 
indigestible dinner in Commons — fifteen 
pages of Smyth's "Lectures on History," so 
that they could repeat them with little 
variation from the text. The training in 
analysis was of very high value in teaching 
men to seize and hold the main points in an 
argument and to make points distinctly in 
the construction of a discourse. On look- 
ing back, I think most of the old students 
will agree that too much value was attached 
to memoriter recitations. 

But none the less, many of them have 
found great advantage in life in the facility 
which they acquired in retaining with accu- 
racy what they read or write. The reaction 
against training the memory has probably 
gone too far in these later days. The natu- 
ral sciences were taught as skilfully as they 
well could be in an overcrowded curriculum, 
and in days when laboratory methods were 
not employed. Personally I gained great 
advantage by being permitted to assist the 

[29] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Professor of Chemistry for two years in 
preparing the experiments which he made 
before the class. In the ancient languages, 
certainly in Greek, I think the professors 
who taught us would now say too much 
time was given to grammatical and philo- 
logical detail and too little to rapid reading. 
But their method was then generally in 
vogue, and the teaching was excellent of its 
kind. 

To nearly every student the most impor- 
tant event in his college life in those days 
was the contact with the vigorous and 
suggestive mind of Dr. Wayland, in the 
senior classroom, and especially during the 
study of moral philosophy. It is difficult 
for those who know Dr. Wayland only by 
his writings, valuable as some of them are, 
to understand how he made so deep an 
impression on his pupils. He was not a 
great scholar; he was imperious, sometimes 
prejudiced; but his mind was singularly 
penetrating and lucid. He insisted on the 
clearest and sharpest definition of terms 
before answering a question or engaging 
in a discussion, and thus often made the 
inquirer answer his own question by an 
accurate definition or rendered the dis- 
cussion superfluous. Withal, he had the 
keenest wit and a thorough knowledge of 

[30] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

men, especially of students. He had the 
happiest way, often a homely way, of stat- 
ing an important truth so that it remained 
forever fixed in the mind of the hearer. 
There was, too, beyond all this, a certain 
power of personal presence, a force of char- 
acter, a moral strength, which lent a tre- 
mendous weight to even his commonest 
words. I have met in my day not a few 
distinguished men; but I recall none who 
have so impressed me with their power of 
personality, none who have uttered so 
many wise words which I recall every week 
to my advantage and help in the duties of 
my daily hfe. He was a very inapt pupil 
who passed from under Dr. Way land's 
instruction without catching something 
of his catholic spirit, his passionate love 
of soul-liberty, and his earnest Christian 
principle. 

The following incidents will give one an 
idea of his manner in the classroom. One 
day a rather conceited man said in the 
class when Dr. Wayland was speaking of 
the great wisdom of the Proverbs in the 
Scriptures, "I do not think there is any- 
thing very remarkable in the Proverbs. 
They are rather commonplace remarks of 
common people." "Very well," rephed the 
Doctor, "make one." 

[31] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

The Doctor's son, Heman Lincoln Way- 
land, one of my classmates, inherited from 
his father a very keen wit. The passes be- 
tween father and son were often very enter- 
taining to the class. One day when we were 
considering a chapter in the father's text 
book on Moral Philosophy, Lincoln arose 
with an expression of great solemnity and 
respect and said, *'Sir, I would hke to pro- 
pound a question." *'Well, my son, go 
on," was the reply. ''Well, sir," said the 
son, "in the learned author's work which 
we are now perusing I observe the follow- 
ing remark," and then he quoted. The 
class saw that fun was at hand, and began 
to laugh. ''Well, what of that?" said the 
father, with a merry twinkle in his eye. 
"Why, this," continued the son. "In an- 
other work of the same learned author, 
entitled 'On the Limitations of Human 
Responsibility,' I find the following pas- 
sage.' He then quoted. Clearly the two 
passages were irreconcilable. The boys were 
delighted to see that the father was in a 
trap, and broke into loud laughter. The 
Doctor's eyes twinkled more merrily, as 
he asked, "Well, what of that .^" "Why," 
said the son with the utmost gravity, "it 
has occurred to me that I should like to 
know how the learned author reconciles the 

[32] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

two statements." "Oh," said the father, 
"that is simple enough. It only shows that 
since he wrote the first book the learned 
author has learned something." 

And this remark reveals one of the strik- 
ing characteristics of Dr. Wayland's mind. 
It was ever growing. It cost him no 
struggle to change his opinion when he had 
good ground for so doing. He imbued his 
students with this open-mindedness. He 
encouraged the fullest and freest discussion 
in the class. The passage in Milton's Areo- 
pagitica about letting truth grapple with 
error was often on his lips. 

During the spring of my Sophomore year 
there arose among the students a deep inter- 
est in personal religion. Though like most 
school boys I had thought with some seri- 
ousness upon religious subjects, I had been 
repelled by the extravagances and excite- 
ments of so-called revivals in the country 
towns and villages, which apparently ap- 
pealed to ignorant and emotional persons 
rather than to the rational and intelligent. 
But here my thoughtful and even my 
merry companions addressed themselves 
calmly but earnestly to the great question 
of determining their duty to God and of 
deciding with what aim and what spirit 
they should hve. The high resolves then 
4 [33] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

formed shaped the careers of a good num- 
ber of the most conspicuous men in college. 
I think they would generally testify that 
they were greatly aided in that critical 
period of their lives by the wise counsels of 
Dr. Caswell and Dr. Wayland. Perhaps 
at no other time did the latter so deeply 
impress the students as when, standing in 
the midst of them in the old chapel, and 
resting one foot on a seat and his arm on 
the raised knee, he looked into their faces 
with those piercing eyes and spoke with 
fatherly tenderness of the divine love. 
With what pathos he repeated the parable 
of the Prodigal Son. None of his published 
sermons gives one any adequate idea of the 
power of those heart-to-heart talks. 

But to us country boys, as we entered 
upon college life, nothing was more fasci- 
nating and more novel and more helpful 
than the access to well-furnished libraries 
and the society of students of marked 
ability and scholarly enthusiasm. The boys 
who are reared in the neighbourhood of 
libraries can have no appreciation of the 
sensations which we country lads, w^hose 
supply of books had been the most meagre 
imaginable, but whose thirst for reading 
was insatiable, experienced in being ush- 
ered into a large library and told that all 

[34] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

these books were now at our service. I 
sometimes tremble to think what an on- 
slaught we made upon the crowded shelves. 
Fortunately association with older students 
soon helped us learn how and what to read. 
For there was at that time — and, I hope, 
always — in Brown a profound interest in 
literary culture. The students, with few 
exceptions, lodged in the dormitories, and 
took their meals in Commons Hall. They 
went little into society in the city. They 
were thus drawn very close to each other. 
The enthusiasm of the more gifted and ac- 
complished scholars was caught in some 
degree by nearly all. I remember that men 
were divided as Carlyleists or anti-Carlyle- 
ists, Coleridgeians or anti-Coleridgeians, 
and so on, and that literary, historic, and 
philosophic theories were as hotly discussed 
as the current political questions of the day. 
Not wishing to be unduly laudator temporis 
actiy I am sure that whoever examines the 
triennial catalogue of Brown for the years 
from 1845 to 1852, will see that the college 
contained within its walls in those years a 
good number, perhaps an exceptionally 
large number, of men whose lives have 
shown that it must have been a high privi- 
lege to be intimately associated w^th them 
in the companionship of student Ufe. The 

[35] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

society of some of them has been one of the 
chief factors in my own education, both in 
college and afterward, and one of the chief 
delights of life. On the w^hole I think that 
any student in Brown University who did 
not graduate in those days with a mind well 
disciplined for entering upon any worthy 
career was himself greatly at fault. 

The careers of the men who were in col- 
lege in my time furnish the best proof of 
the value of the training then given. I may 
name a few of one hundred and forty stu- 
dents who were my college mates. In the 
class of 1846 were Thomas Durfee, Chief 
Justice of Rhode Island, a man of poetic 
gifts as well as of legal attainments; Frank- 
lin J. Dickman, a Justice of the Supreme 
Court of Ohio, a man of fine literary taste 
and acquirements; Samuel S. Cox, for 
many years a prominent member of Con- 
gress, first from Ohio, and afterwards from 
New York, and subsequently United States 
Minister to Turkey, a gifted speaker; and 
Francis Wayland, Dean of the Yale Law 
School. In the class of 1847 were Profes- 
sor George P. Fisher, of the Yale Theologi- 
cal School, distinguished as a writer in 
ecclesiastical history, and James P. Boyce, 
President of the Southern Baptist Theologi- 
cal School at Louisville, Kentucky. In 

[36] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

the class of 1848 was Pendleton Murrah, 
Governor of Texas in the last years of the 
Civil War. In my own class, 1849, were 
Benjamin F. Thurston, one of the leading 
patent lawyers in the country; James Til- 
linghast, long the leading lawyer in Rhode 
Island on real estate; Juhan Hartridge, a 
most eloquent member of the Confederate 
Congress, and afterwards of the Union Con- 
gress, and Rowland Hazard, one of the most 
eminent business men of his time and en- 
dowed w^ith superior scientific and literary 
gifts. In the class of 1850 were James O. 
Murray, a prominent Presbyterian divine 
and Professor and Dean in Princeton Col- 
lege, and Edward L. Pierce, conspicuous in 
pubHc affairs in Massachusetts and biog- 
rapher of Charles Sumner. In the class of 
1851 was Professor J. L. Diman whom I 
regard as one of the most gifted men I have 
know^n, the most conspicuous teacher of 
history of his generation, but who died 
while in the very prime of his strength. 

We students in Brown beheved that there 
was no better teaching in any college than 
in ours. Since reading Senator Hoar's 
description of the instruction at Harvard 
at the same time, and Andrew D. White's 
description of the instruction at Yale a 
Httle later, I am inchned to think that our 

[37] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

impression was correct. The one college 
teacher of that time whose instruction took 
rank with that of Dr. Wayland was Mark 
Hopkins, President of Williams College. 

Immediately after leaving college I had 
an experience not unusual for young gradu- 
ates. It was necessary for me to do some- 
thing for my maintenance; but I found 
nowhere any call for my services. I had 
left the warm and genial atmosphere of col- 
lege life to plunge into the great busy world 
and realized what Schiller meant when he 
said he stretched out his arms to serve the 
world and found he had clasped a lump of 
ice. The great, busy world went on its way 
and apparently had no use for me and ho 
sympathy with me. The contrast between 
the warm companionships of college days 
and this sense of loneliness and isolation and 
uselessness made the experience of those few 
weeks following graduation the most painful 
of my life. The recollection of it has led me 
often to warn students against being too 
much discouraged by a similar fortune. 

For in due time I was invited to take the 
place of Assistant Librarian in Brown Uni- 
versity for a part of each day, and to 
spend another part in teaching a boy who 
was prevented by weakness of his eyes from 
the study of books. The compensation was 

[38] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

very modest, but it gave me the great de- 
light of returning to the society of college 
friends and teachers, and the equal delight 
of having free access to the library, and, 
incidentally, of guiding to a considerable 
degree the reading of undergraduates. 
During the work of classifying and arrang- 
ing the books in the library an amusing 
incident occurred, deserving perhaps to be 
recorded among the "Curiosities of Liter- 
ature." One of the staff, coming upon 
Edgeworth's book on "Irish Bulls," cata- 
logued and placed it among the works on 
agriculture. This was itself one of the best 
of Irish Bulls. 

I read aloud from one to two hours a day 
interesting books to my pupil, and was 
surprised to find how many volumes we 
finished by reading thus for about six 
months.^ I gave a part of my leisure hours 

I I take pleasure in saying that this receptive pupil, 
with whom I maintained the relations of the most cordial 
friendship until his death, was Thomas Poynton Ives, son 
of Moses Brown Ives, of the house of Brown and Ives. 
When the Civil War broke out, young Ives placed his 
yacht at the service of the government, enlisted as the 
commander of it, equipped it for service, and was sta- 
tioned in the Chesapeake. He married Miss Motley, 
daughter of Motley the historian, but did not long sur- 
vive the marriage. She afterward married Sir William 
Vernon Harcourt, the distinguished English statesman. 

[39] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

to my classical studies, re-reading "Vir^'ir* 
and readiiii;- lor the first time Demos- 
tlienes' "Oration on the C^rown." 

In the spring of 1850 I took a severe cold, 
^vliieh seriously atVeeted my throat. Never 
having been ill, it did not occur to me that 
I ought to refrain for a time from oral 
instruction to my pupil. I continued to 
talk and read five hours a day to him until 
I became too hoarse to continue. I thus 
fastened an inflannnation on my throat, 
from which I have never fully recovered. 
I returned to my father's house and spent 
the summer in the attempt to recuperate, 
but was only partially successful. INIean- 
time my classmate and intimate friend, 
Kowland Hazard, had been suffering from 
hemorrhage of the lungs. Ilis father, Row- 
land G. Hazard, a prosperous manufacturer, 
who afterwards became somewhat noted for 
writings on philosophic subjects, and who 
m earlv life had travelled on business 
errands extensivelv in the South, thought 
that it would be beneficial to his son to 
make a journey on horseback through the 
South. But he deemed it hardly prudent 
for the young man to go alone. So, know- 
ing my condition, he invited me to accom- 
pany his son on this southern journey, and 
I accepted the invitation with pleasure. 

[40] 



II 

THE SOUTIIP:iiN JOURNEY 

Setting out on my southern journey, I 
left horn(* October 5, 1850, and went to 
I\-ace Dale. Tuesday evening we started 
for Philadelphia via New York. We spent 
some days in I^hiladelphia, where my friend 
had numerous relatives. During our stay 
we heard Albert 13arnes j^reaeh a very plain 
and simple sermon, somewhat in the style 
of his then famous notes on the Gospels. 
We also heard Jenny Lind, then on her first 
tour, sing. I have never been so impressed 
by singing as by her rendering of "I know 
that my Jledeemer hveth." Philadelphia 
had many objects of interest to me, Inde- 
pendence Hall, the Mint, the Schuylkill, 
Fairmount, etc. 

We got our outfit of saddles and bridles 
and went via Baltimore to IIari>er's Ferry 
and Winchester. When we had planned to 
set out on horseback for a journey through 
the South, we had clothed ourselves in suits 
of heavy gray cloth, and steeple-crowned, 
brick-coloured hats, known as California 
hats. We had india-rubber ponchos for use 

[41] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

in rainy weather. Our effects were packed 
in saddle bags. We purchased two excel- 
lent horses here. 

We had letters to some intelligent men 
in Winchester. From conversation with 
them we received the impression that the 
more thoughtful regarded slavery as eco- 
nomically of no advantage to that section; 
but they did not relish the attitude of the 
North in criticizing them for continuing to 
maintain it. Some of them seemed to be in 
a rather confused state of mind, admiring 
the prosperity of the North, expressing de- 
votion to the Union, but defending their 
course in retaining their negroes in bondage. ^ 

1 One gentleman, who had attended the annual meeting 
of the Railroad Company at Harper's Ferry., and had in- 
dulged rather freely in the beverages offered, amused us 
by a sort of speech, with which he welcomed us. The 
following are extracts : 

"Gentlemen, we welcome you to Virginia. It is all 
important that you go back with right impressions, that 
you should go back Union men. Now my niggers live 
the same as I do, not at the same table, but have the same 
food. Every dish is carried for them into an adjoining 
room, a plastered room, Gents. 

"What is the use then of kicking up such a fuss in the 
kitchen? Why don't we say that you sha'n't have gray 
cattle or no cattle or yellow cattle.? What business is that 
to us.? Now would it not be a pretty spectacle to see the 
bayonets at Springfield clashing with those made at 
Harper's Ferry? Would it not be sublime, Gents of the 

[42] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

We were deeply impressed with the pros- 
perity of the Shenandoah Valley as we 
travelled along its great highway. Wagons 
laden with corn and the other products of 

North, to see you and me sticking each other in the abdo- 
men? What do you want to do it for? New England, 
God bless her! We love her. All the goods I sell come 
from New England. She is the bone and the sinew and 
the back and the breast and the head and the all. We 
love her, we do. We want you to go North with right 
impressions. 

"Then there is a man up above here that has two hun- 
dred nappy-heads. Now, Gents, that seems strange to 
you. Yet they fare well. Now here's my Jim. WTiat 
is the matter with him? That's Jim, sleeps eighteen hours 
out of the twenty-four. Gents, you can see plenty of 
pretty girls in Virginia, with Virginia fortunes, ten niggers, 
and if you want to marry one you can do it fast enough. 
You tell her you are an abolitionist. She kisses you a few 
times, says the niggers are doing well enough. Pretty 
soon you would fight for them niggers. It is so, Gents. 
Now, Gentlemen of the North, why can't we keep united? 
The Jews were formerly the chosen people of God. Now 
if you'll look in Deuteronomy, Exodus, somewhere along 
there, you'll find they disobeyed God and He set his face 
against them and turned to the Gentile nations of the 
West. W^e are the West, Gents. We are a great and 
growing country. We are E Pluribus Unum, One out of 
many. God bless us! What is the use then, I say, of 
kicking up a row in the kitchen? We of the South want 
you of the North to go back with right impressions, Union 
men. Amicitia, Amor, et Veritas. Love your country 
and be true; the translation of that is, Gents, love 
America and be true." 

[43] 



REMINISCENCES OP 

the fertile farms passed on in continuous pro- 
cession towards Winchester, the terminus 
of the railway from Harper's Ferry. We 
visited Weyer's Cave, which though not so 
extensive as the better known Mammoth 
Cave in Kentucky, was as beautiful and 
striking to us who had never seen such a 
geological formation. From Waynesboro 
we crossed the Blue Ridge by the Rockfish 
Gap. Under Monsieur Crozet, a French 
engineer, the men were driving the tunnel 
for the railway. Our immediate destination 
was Charlottesville. We wished to visit 
Monticello, the home of Jefferson, and the 
University of Virginia. 

We reached Turpin's Hotel in the after- 
noon. Our costume was hardly calculated 
to impress strangers with the idea that we 
were entitled to special civilities at their 
hands. In fact we had generally been taken 
by the men we had met on the road for 
drovers, who were seeking cattle, or for bill 
collectors, sent out by northern firms to dun 
their debtors. More than once those who 
held the latter theory put whip to their 
horses to escape from us. 

But in the evening we had a fine example 

of Virginia hospitality. In some way a 

group of gentlemen sitting near us in the 

hotel learned the object of our visit to the 

' [44] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

town, and notwithstanding our costume 
proffered their services to make our visit 
agreeable. The oldest of them, Mr. Wil- 
liam Gilmer, widely known as we soon 
learned as Billy Gilmer, introduced himself, 
saying that he had received courtesies in 
New England and that he and his friends 
would be glad to entertain us. He intro- 
duced us to them and immediately began to 
lay out a programme of hospitalities which 
would have occupied us for a week or ten 
days. *'You will go to dinner with me to- 
night, to-morrow we will go to Southold's, 
the next day we will have a fox hunt," and 
so on. We were obliged to decline this 
kind offer; but we told him we should be 
obhged to him if he could help us gain 
access to Monticello, since we had heard it 
was closed to visitors. '*0h, yes," he re- 
plied, "I will go with you to-morrow 
morning. As a child I grew up a neighbour 
of Jefferson and was often in his house. I 
will see that you get in." 

The next morning he appeared at the 
appointed hour. Monticello is about two 
miles from the town. As we rode up the 
hill he told us some interesting stories 
about Mr. Jefferson, w^hich I here give on 
his authority. 

The view from the hill commands the two 

[45] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

fertile counties of Fluvanna and Louisa. 
"If in the place of them there had been a 
lake," Jefferson used to say, "this would 
have been the finest situation on earth." 
"And," added Mr. Gilmer, "if he could 
have had his way, he would have sunk them 
both in the lake." 

Pointing to a wooded peak rising behind 
Monticello, he said that Mr. Jefferson once 
planned a sawmill to be placed there and 
driven by a windmill, since there is always 
a breeze up there. When some wood-man 
asked how he would get the logs up there to 
be sawed, he was nonplussed. 

Mr. Jefferson, who was much interested 
in scientific matters, had been led to adopt 
the theory that the western prairies were 
almost treeless because the mastodons, be- 
heved to be arboraceous, had gnawed down 
and consumed the trees which originally 
grew on them. A wag of the neighbour- 
hood, Billy Preston, was aware of Jeffer- 
son's views on this subject. On a journey 
which Preston made to Illinois, he wrote to 
Jefferson that he had found a remarkable 
confirmation of his theory. He had come 
upon the remains of a mastodon in a slough, 
in which the animal had been mired, and 
just where the stomach must have been 
there was a great mass of what appeared to 

[46] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

be sawdust, evidently the tree which had 
been eaten. Mr. Jefferson was so gratified 
at this news that he at once wrote a Memoir 
on the matter and sent it to his scientific 
correspondents in France. 

We passed the monument to Jefferson 
just before we reached the entrance to the 
grounds. It was badly mutilated by visit- 
ors who had broken off chips of the stone 
as souvenirs. The stew^ard in charge of the 
estate happened to be near the gate which, 
however, was locked. Mr. Gilmer shouted 
to him from afar in the most famihar man- 
ner; but as we reached the gate, the stew- 
ard informed us that Captain Le\y, the 
naval oflScer, into whose possession the 
estate had come through his marriage, had 
left the strictest orders that during his ab- 
sence in Europe no one should be admitted 
to the house. We had heard that Captain 
Levy had taken offence because he had not 
been received as ^persona grata by his 
neighbours. On the announcement by the 
steward of this prohibition, Mr. Gilmer 
evinced deep anguish. "This is really too 
bad," he exclaimed. '*Here are tw^o sons of 
old acquaintances and friends of Mr. Jef- 
ferson, who have ridden hundreds of miles 
to pay a tribute to his memory, to visit his 
residence as a sacred shrine, and now they 

[47] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

are to be shut out. If Mr. Jefferson were 
alive, how he would have greeted them! 
Oh no! this cannot be, my good friend. 
Allow me, sir, to introduce you to Mr. 
Charles Francis Adams, the son of John 
Quincy Adams, and to Mr. Fletcher Web- 
ster, the son of Daniel Webster!" As it 
happened he called me, who was about the 
size of Mr. Adams, Mr. Webster, and Mr. 
Hazard, who was six feet high, Mr. Adams. 
He had not notified us of his intention to 
play this trick, and it required our best 
efforts to play the parts assigned us with- 
out breaking into laughter. The steward 
was evidently a little puzzled to explain to 
himself how so distinguished men should 
appear in such costume. But he yielded 
to Mr. Gilmer's request with the remark 
that he supposed Captain Levy would not 
object to the admission of such visitors. 
We were shown about the grounds and the 
house. In Jefferson's sleeping room was 
the bed on which he died, July 4, 1826. 
On the mantel were two small statues of 
him. In the dining room was a bust of 
Voltaire. The furniture of the house was 
wrapped in coverings. In the silence and 
the dim light which was admitted through 
the half -closed shutters, the house in which 
so many statesmen had discussed the grav- 

[48] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

est public questions seemed in fact a tomb. 
For once even the merry talk of our friend 
Gilmer fell with a certain dissonance on the 
ear. 

In the afternoon we rode out to the Uni- 
versity. A student, Mr. Chalmers, intro- 
duced us to the Librarian, Mr. Wirtenbaker, 
who received us very cordially. The stu- 
dent's dormitories and the lecture halls, 
planned as was the University itself by 
Mr. Jefferson, still stand as we saw them 
on two sides of the beautiful Green, though 
other and finer structures have since been 
added. 

Perhaps this is the best place to say that 
I attended the inauguration of President 
Alderman, in the spring of 1905. Being 
invited to speak at the banquet, I found 
that there were few, if any, persons present 
whose memory of the town and the Uni- 
versity reached back as far as mine. When 
I gave some of the reminiscences above 
recorded, the audience seemed highly enter- 
tained, especially by my report of the acts 
and stories of "Billy Gilmer," the reputa- 
tion of whose w^it and humour has survived 
in that region. 

We crossed the Blue Ridge to Staunton. 
On this journey w^e first saw negro w^omen 
working in the fields. In Staunton we 
5 [49] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

visited the State Institution for the Blind 
and for the Deaf and Dumb, and the State 
Lunatic Asylum. From Staunton we went 
to Lexington, then and afterwards noted 
for the State Military Institute, at which 
some of the most distinguished confederate 
officers were educated. Stonewall Jackson 
was a professor here when the Civil War 
broke out. 

My journey up the Shenandoah Valley 
proved of essential service to me in my 
editorial work during the war, because 
that valley was the scene of so many mili- 
tary operations of importance, which I had 
occasion to discuss. 

From Lexington we went to the Natural 
Bridge, where the boldness of the scenery 
surpassed our expectations. We started 
from the bridge for the Balcony Falls on 
the James River. On our journey, when we 
supposed we must be approaching our des- 
tination, we inquired of a man whom we 
met how far it was to Balcony Falls. He 
looked at us in astonishment. He said he 
had never heard of them. We expressed 
our surprise at this, when suddenly he put 
his hand to his forehead and exclaimed, 
"Oh, you mean Bel-co-ny (with the accent 
on the second syllable) Falls," and then gave 
us the desired information. We found 

[50] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

them, a picturesque spot, where the river 
breaks through a narrow gorge filled with 
rocks. Passing a tollgate on our ride, we 
asked the gatekeeper, a woman, how much 
we had to pay for two of us. She rephed 
that the toll was three cents for one, but 
she was unable to reckon the total amount 
for two. As my companion was noted in 
college for his mathematical attainments, I 
called on him to solve the problem, which 
he did, and we passed through. 

By almost impassable roads and lanes we 
went to the Peaks of Otter. We forded one 
stream thirty-two times in going seven 
miles. The views from these peaks were 
very extensive and impressive. None, we 
were assured, on all the mountain ranges of 
Virginia are more so. We paused a few 
hours in Lynchburg, which then had about 
eight hundred inhabitants. Its chief trade 
was in tobacco. We went next to Dan- 
ville. On the way we passed the Isle of 
Pines, lying in Staunton River, and formerly 
owned by Patrick Henry. We also passed 
two small villages known by the significant 
names of Hard Times and Scuffletown. We 
were told by one of the natives that in that 
region they raised *'a right smart chance of 
sheep and snorting crops of tobacco." But 
the soil was really thin and in a large part 

[51] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of our route covered with forest. We 
met hardly any travellers in a whole day's 
ride. So far as we could judge from our 
conversations with Virginians on our whole 
journey from Winchester to Danville, that 
is from Northern to Southern Virginia, 
opinions as to the desirableness of main- 
taining slavery were divided. Not a few 
were convinced that it was of no advantage 
to their State. But no one could make the 
journey we did without being impressed 
with the great natural resources of the 
State, with the attractiveness of the scenery 
on both sides of the Blue Ridge, and with 
the shrewdness, intelligence, and activity 
of the inhabitants of the Shenandoah 
Valley. 

Passing from Danville into North Caro- 
lina, we travelled on a level ridge for twenty- 
seven miles without crossing a stream. We 
came also on the first camp we had seen of 
a slave trader, buying up negroes to take to 
the gulf states. That was a prosperous 
business both in Virginia and in the Caro- 
hnas. Some of the table arrangements in 
Danville and in towns further south were 
novel. Beef steak was served in a large, 
deep potato dish, from which you drew your 
rations with a spoon. Butter, a most 
hberal supply, from one to three pounds, 

[52] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

was placed in slices on the largest plate on 
the table. Sometimes this plate was placed 
on an inverted bowl, sometimes on a cir- 
cular board twelve or fifteen inches in di- 
ameter, which was supported on a wooden 
standard a foot high. 

Our journey to Greensboro, North Caro- 
hna (named after General Green of revolu- 
tionary fame), took us over the battlefield 
of Guilford Court House, and over the region 
in which Cornwallis and Green contended 
for some time. A venerable man, said to be 
the oldest in Martinsville, assured us that 
Washington fought the battle with Corn- 
waUis and won it. He modestly added that 
he remembered nothing more about it. 

Near Greensboro we visited the Hodgins 
Gold Mine, which was then worked with 
profit, but like the other North Carohna 
gold mines was afterwards abandoned. 
The gold was found chiefly in the earthy 
matter which surrounded the loose quartz. 
Copper was also found. We also went to 
see the mines of Gold Hill where they were 
taking out four hundred dollars worth of 
gold daily. 

We passed through Salisbury to Char- 
lotte. There was here a branch mint, 
where they made no coins larger than five 
dollar pieces. They employed only four 

[53] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

men in their work. We crossed the State 
hne into South CaroHna, and traversed 
Lancaster County, passing over the scene 
of Sumter's and of Gates' mihtary opera- 
tions in the Revolution. The soil was hght 
and sandy. Lofty pines were here first en- 
countered. In this region we met the first 
advocates of secession. Some of them 
warned us that it would be dangerous for 
us to approach Columbia. We replied that 
we would continue our journey until we 
saw signs of danger. 

Camden we found an attractive town of 
between two and three thousand inhabi- 
tants. De Kalb's remains lie beneath a 
monument in the Presbyterian church. 
His name was given to a cotton factory 
which we visited. Near it was the figure 
of an iron man on which Colonel Dickinson, 
killed in the Mexican War, had practised 
with his pistol in preparation for a duel. 
We were told that a duel had been fought 
in the town a year before our visit, and an- 
other two years before. Public opinion 
seemed to approve of duelling. Camden 
was CornwalHs' headquarters at one period 
in his southern campaign. The Camden 
Journal was a violent secession sheet. 

On the road from Camden to Columbia 
we passed large fields of cotton, one a mile 

[54] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

long. As the Legislature was in session 
we found it impossible to gain admission to 
any hotel, but after a long search in the 
evening were received at a boarding house. 
The next day being Sunday, we had the 
good fortune to hear Rev. Dr. Thornwell, 
one of the most distinguished preachers in 
the South, deliver the baccalaureate sermon 
to the graduating class of the University 
of South Carolina. It was a discourse of 
great power. 

On the next day we attended the 
Commencement exercises. The Governor 
(Seabrook), the President of the Senate, the 
Speaker of the House, and a group of promi- 
nent citizens occupied the stage. We were 
rather surprised to see a supply of cus- 
pidors on the stage for tobacco chewers, and 
they were by no means superfluous fur- 
niture. We thought the students' speeches 
were only moderately good. The Presi- 
dent's address to them was solely an appeal 
to them to abide by the State in the disso- 
lution of the Union which he regarded as 
inevitable. He exhorted them to fight and 
conquer or fall beneath the Palmetto banner. 
Several of the students' speeches referred to 
the secession of the States as certain to come. 

On the following day we visited the Leg- 
islature. The halls were hung in mourn- 

[55] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

ing for Calhoun. During this session the 
speeches abounded with allusions to the 
coming dissolution of the Union. In the 
evening we took tea with Mrs. McCord, a 
most gifted and learned w^oman, the daugh- 
ter of that eminent statesman, Langdon 
Cheves. Though extremely cordial to us 
personally, she expressed what seemed to be 
the general feeling in Columbia when she 
said to us, "We ought to fight you of the 
North." It will be remembered that this 
was nearly nine years before the attack on 
Fort Sumter. 

From Columbia we set out for Augusta, 
Georgia. At the end of the second day's 
journey we halted before a house and in- 
quired for Leestown, w^hich appeared on the 
map. No other house was visible. "This 
is Leestown," responded a man, who proved 
to be Mr. Lee. He informed us — we had 
not failed to observe it — that the land in 
that neighbourhood produced little or noth- 
ing. The country we had passed through 
was of course very sparsely settled. We 
lodged at Mr. Lee's. As we entered Ham- 
burg, opposite Augusta, we saw twenty 
negroes marching round a piazza singing 
merrily. They were for sale. Not even 
this fact depressed their spirits. 

We found Augusta the most attractive 

[56] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

southern city we had seen. It had about 
twelve thousand inhabitants. The two 
principal streets were lined with fine dwell- 
ings. One of them, a mile or more in 
length, had two rows of trees in the middle, 
and one row on each side. There were two 
large cotton mills under the charge of a 
man brought from Lowell, Massachusetts. 
They were as well equipped as any we had 
seen at home. The operatives were all 
white. We made a vain attempt to sell 
our horses, as we learned that owing to the 
sparseness of the population in southwestern 
Georgia we should find it very uncomfort- 
able travelling on horseback to middle 
Florida, where we had decided to go for the 
remainder of the winter. We left the 
horses in Augusta, while we went by rail 
to Charleston, South Carolina. 

We had to leave at five a.m., without 
breakfast. We stopped for breakfast near 
Aiken. Mr. Hazard paid for our meals. 
As we were sitting by the fire near a Vir- 
ginian, the whistle blew and we three started 
for the train. A negro waiter came run- 
ning after us, exclaiming, "Didn't one of 
you gemmens forgit to pay for breakfast?" 
Mr. Hazard replied, "We paid." The Vir- 
ginian, looking the negro fiercely in the 
eye, said sharply, "Which is it.^ Point 

[57] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

him out." "I d'n know," said the negro. 
*' Point him out," repeated the Virginian. 
By this time the cars were moving and we 
all jumped in. **That is my fix," coolly 
remarked the Virginian to us. 

Till we were within four miles of Charles- 
ton, we were passing through a succession 
of cypress swamps and pine barrens. We 
spent a few days in Charleston most agree- 
ably. Our classmate, Mendenhall, and 
friends to whom we had letters, received us 
with the hospitality characteristic of that 
city. The houses were generally built in 
the Grecian style of architecture, with 
broad piazzas on three sides. Magnolias 
and live oaks abounded in the open spaces. 
We made an excursion up Cooper's River 
to see the rice fields, and to Sullivan's 
Island, which was then a summer resort 
for the Charlestonians. We obtained our 
trunks which we had sent by sea from 
Baltimore. Mr. Hazard had been robbed 
of a part of his wardrobe; but we were 
enabled to lay aside our suits of Vermont 
gray and dress in proper form to receive 
the hospitalities of our friends. 

Mr. and Mrs. McCord having invited us 
when we were at Columbia to spend the 
Christmas holidays with them on their 
plantation at Fort Motte, some thirty miles 

[58] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

south of Columbia, we gladly availed our- 
selves of the opportunity to see something 
of plantation life under so auspicious cir- 
cumstances. On December nineteenth we 
went by rail from Charleston. We were 
most cordially received by our host and 
hostess who were living in a fine mansion 
surrounded by grounds laid out in excellent 
taste. 

We walked out with Mr. McCord to the 
negro quarters. He had one hundred and 
thirty-seven negroes, and was building new 
and comfortable tenements for them. He 
had a house in which all the negro children 
w^ere kept during the day in charge of at- 
tendants, and a hospital provided with 
nurses. Every negro had his particular 
task and drew his ration of food. The 
arrangements were very systematical. The 
children sang hymns for us and all of them 
down to the veriest tot sang con amove, as 
legs, arms, and bodies were all called into 
requisition. The plantation called *'Lang 
Syne" had about three thousand acres and 
produced from one hundred and eighty to 
two hundred bales of cotton. We were 
hospitably entertained by dinner parties 
and hunting parties on the plantations in 
the neighbourhood. Partridges, rabbits, 
and squirrels were the game sought. The 

[59] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

negroes running and shouting rivalled the 
dogs in securing the game shot. 

Our visit corrected our impression that 
the life of the planter and his wife was one 
free from care. They did have more leisure 
than the northern farmer. But careful 
management was required to secure good 
profits. And the negroes, careless about 
their health, called for much attention. 
Our hostess, during our visit, was up all 
night caring for a sick negro baby. She 
had made a careful study of political 
economy and had translated a valuable 
French work on that subject. She had 
given much attention to the economics of 
plantation life. She told us that she w^ould 
prefer to have $25,000 in good bank stock 
rather than $100,000 in negroes and plan- 
tations. The negroes of "Lang Syne" 
seemed cheerful and merry, especially when 
they came on Christmas day to the house 
to draw their extra Christmas rations. But 
we were much impressed by an incident 
which occurred while, on our departure, we 
were on the way to the railway station. 
The negro driver was a grave elderly man, 
a Baptist preacher, in fact, for his people. I 
ventured to say to him, ''You servants must 
all be very happy in your lot with such a 
kind master and mistress." He answered 

[60] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

not a word, but looked at me with a sur- 
prised and pathetic air, which seemed to 
me to say, ''You, who are from the North, 
ought to know that slavery is not a happy 
condition." I dropped the conversation, 
but I have never forgotten the expression 
of his countenance. 

While waiting for a delayed train at the 
station, we met a hotel keeper from Quincy, 
Florida, whose commendations of his town 
decided us to go there for the winter. Mr. 
Hazard stopped at Aiken, where we were 
to remain a few days, and I went on to 
Augusta to bring the horses down. The 
people at the hotel hardly recognized me, as 
I no longer wore the riding costume in 
which they had seen me. The horses hav- 
ing been in the stable three weeks I had 
a lively time, riding one and leading the 
other. It rained heavily all day. I ar- 
rived at Aiken soaked to the skin. The 
next day as Mr. Hazard and I were taking a 
ride, his horse ran away and he was thrown 
heavily against a tree, but fortunately my 
fear that he was seriously hurt proved to 
be unfounded. We sold the horses and 
saddles and bridles for a little more than 
they cost us. We remained a week in 
Aiken. It rained almost every day, and 
once we had snow three or four inches deep 

[01] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

at which some of the negro children were 
much excited, as they had never before 
seen it. 

On January 6, 1851, we set out from 
Aiken for Florida. We sat up, as there 
were no sleeping cars on the trains in those 
days, all night on the journey from Augusta 
to Atlanta. This place was just getting 
started as the junction point of three rail- 
roads. We went on at once to Macon, the 
farthest point on our route which we could 
then reach by rail. At 10.30 p.m. we 
started from there in a small coach. Why 
I know not, but all through the South the 
coaches which we took generally started in 
the night, some of them at 2 a.m. We 
had hardly left the town when the coach 
was upset, and unluckily the only door was 
on the side next to the ground. We broke 
the window on the other side and crawled 
out into the mud. I took the driver's lan- 
tern and walked ahead, while Mr. Hazard 
held up the coach to keep it from capsizing 
again. After awhile we remounted, but 
had not gone far before the coach fell 
plump into a mud hole so as to pitch off a 
clergyman from the driver's seat and to 
pitch the driver off headlong after him. It 
proved we were near a camp of negro 
teamsters who had a lightwood fire and 

[62] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

some loads of furniture. We cut down 
chairs and sat by the fire and waited un- 
til nearly daylight, when a larger and bet- 
ter coach came to our relief. Frequently, 
during the journey the mud was so deep 
that we had to alight and w^alk in the 
night as well as in the daytime to enable 
the horses to draw the empty vehicle. As 

1 sat with the driver, he pointed out to me 
the sloughs in which the coach had been 
upset on previous trips. The food at the 
inns was as bad as could be. 

One day we had a long fast because we 
reached no inn. The country was very 
sparsely settled. The roads were indescrib- 
ably bad; swamps, corduroys, roots of trees, 
gullies, mud holes, creeks to be forded, were 
our obstacles. Three nights we travelled 
in these conditions, much of the time in 
heavy rain, and finally reached Quincy at 

2 A.M., after the most fatiguing and un- 
comfortable journey we had ever taken. 
This was Friday morning and we had not 
been in bed since Sunday night. South- 
western Georgia, as we saw it, was not 
very inviting. 

As we were taking a late breakfast in the 
hotel, the morning of our arrival, we wit- 
nessed a scene which was disturbing to 
northern young men. The negro waiter 

[63] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

whom we had sent to the kitchen to fill our 
order, in crossing the back yard, fell into a 
fight with another negro. In the midst of 
the tumult a white man appeared with a 
raw hide and began to lay it on the back 
of our waiter with great force. The boy in 
his pain ran and struck his head repeatedly 
against the brick wall as if to dash out his 
brains. But the white man continued his 
blows until the negro fell to the ground. 
We were told that the white man was his 
owner and was a citizen of New Jersey, of 
a family so distinguished that if I should 
mention his name most readers of these 
lines would recall it as familiar. It is need- 
less to say that we did not care for any 
more breakfast. 

We walked out soon after to the front of 
the courthouse, where a crowd was gath- 
ered. We found they were selling at auc- 
tion the slaves of a citizen who had recently 
died. The negro families that were to be 
separated were evincing much feeling. A 
fine looking girl, about eighteen years old, 
was mounting the block as we arrived. 
The auctioneer rudely proceeded to speak 
of her good points, as he might of those of a 
horse. He made her show her teeth, coarse 
men came to feel of her ankles and the 
calves of her legs, to test the quality of her 

[64] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

muscles. It was the most repulsive and 
disgusting spectacle we had ever seen. We 
felt that this scene and that at the hotel 
were showing us a side of slavery that we 
had learned nothing of in the hospitable 
homes of South Carolina. Near the town 
there were constantly camps of negroes, 
whom slave dealers had brought from the 
northern slave states. 

We spent three months in Quincy. A 
considerable company of invalids were win- 
tering there. As we met each morning at 
the post-ofBce, their habitual conversation 
concerning their coughs and expectorations 
and other tuberculous symptoms, were not 
very exhilarating, though fortunately w^e 
were not ill enough to be much disturbed 
by them. We were very hospitably re- 
ceived by the citizens, many of whom were 
persons of intelligence and excellent char- 
acter. That part of Florida had been 
mainly settled from the Carolinas. Not a 
few of the men, after unsuccessful business 
ventures elsewhere, had come there to 
make a fresh start in life, and were as de- 
voted to money-getting as they supposed 
the Yankees to be. Land was cheap and 
well adapted to the growth of cotton, which 
was the chief crop. As no railways had 
reached that section, marketing the cotton 

[65] 
6 



REMINISCENCES OF 

was difficult and costly. It was sent for 
shipment to St. Marks. There were in the 
neighbourhood an undesirable number of 
men who had fled from creditors with no 
intention of paying their debts and of men 
who had committed crimes in their old 
homes. Among this rougher element, 
drunkenness and violence were not uncom- 
mon. The rooms we rented were over a 
surgeon's office. It was a rare week when 
some one who had been wounded in a fray 
did not require the surgeon's attention. On 
the other hand the town was an educational 
centre for Middle Florida. There was an 
excellent boarding school for girls, kept by 
two cultivated w^omen from Connecticut. 
There was also a boarding school for boys. 
The churches had one undesirable feature 
in their construction. They had no under- 
pinning, but rested on posts three or four 
feet high. Unhappily the swine which 
were allowed to run in the streets made 
their lounging place under the churches. 
The rain flowed into the excavation they 
made, and in these pools fleas were bred 
in profusion. Unhappily also the floors 
of some of the churches were so loosely 
laid that the fleas often made their way 
up through the cracks, and climbing up 
under the garments of the worshippers 

[66] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

greatly interfered with a reverential enjoy- 
ment of the services. 

We thought that there and generally in 
the South a larger proportion of the people 
attended church than in the North. I have 
been struck with the fact that Southern po- 
litical orators indulge much more than 
Northern speakers in scriptural allusions 
and quotations. Is it because the South- 
erners are more familiar with the Bible 
than the Northerners? I will mention one 
incident which may show that some of the 
southern children are as unfamiliar with it 
as the Northern children, whose unfamiliar- 
ity with it is so often commented on in our 
days. Finding that the daughter of our 
boarding-house keeper and some of her 
companions, girls of fourteen or jBfteen 
years of age, were not much interested in 
the Biblical narratives, I imitated a device, 
which I had somewhere read about, that 
Franklin tried with a company of French 
infidels with success. Having promised to 
tell them an Oriental story w^hich I thought 
would interest them, I narrated in my ow^n 
language the story of Esther. Not one of 
them, it proved, had read it. When they 
expressed their delight with it, I told them 
where they would find it told in a more much 
touching manner. 

[67] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

I must repeat one incident illustrating 
how one's native place is to him the centre 
of the world. A rather dull, overgrown boy 
of fifteen once asked me where we came 
from. I replied "from Rhode Island." 
"How far away is that? " he asked. "About 
thirteen hundred miles," said I. " Golly," he 
rejoined, " I don't see how you stand it to hve 
so fur off." In fact the knowledge of the 
hfe and industries and ideas of the North 
among even the more intelligent was natur- 
ally very limited. But they were charitable 
enough to me to urge me very strongly to 
remain in Quincy and teach. 

In March we made an excursion to 
Tallahassee and St. Marks. The road to 
the capitol lay through forests and swamps. 
At one point near Ocklocknee Channel, 
posts were set up to guide the stage driver 
in swimming his horses where water over- 
flowed the road. Tallahassee was made 
attractive by its beautiful gardens. On 
coming south we were impressed by the fact 
that the farther south we came the more 
intenselv Calvinistic and severe was the 
theology which inspired the preaching. In 
Tallahassee we heard by far the sternest and 
most sulphurous discourse we listened to. 

A dilapidated railway, on which a car 
was drawn by horses, connected the city 

[68] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

with Newport. The one pubhc building in 
this new town was used for a church, an 
academy, a masonic lodge, a courthouse, 
and a jail. From Newport we walked three 
miles to St. Mark's, the old seaport for this 
region. One warehouse and liaH-a-dozen 
dilapidated, weather-beaten houses com- 
posed the town. The remains of the old 
Spanish fort showed still a part of the wall 
and parapets and moat. General Jackson 
seized it in 1818. Creepers and peach trees 
were growing from its sides. We sailed 
down to the lighthouse, eight miles, passing 
Port Leon on the way, and gained our first 
view of the blue waters of the GuK of 
Mexico. Here, too, we first saw cormo- 
rants and alhgators. When returning by 
the railway we found that fire in the 
forests had set the track on fire at several 
points; but the driver put whip to his 
horses and carried our street car safely 
through the fire. 

The next day we drove sixteen miles to 
see the Wakulla Spring. We passed a few 
cabins on the road, tenanted by sallow, 
wretched-looking people. This spring, of 
which the Indian name Wakulla is said to 
mean *' Mystery," breaks out of a sub- 
merged limestone cliff, one hundred and 
ninety feet down and forms a pool one hun- 

[69] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

dred feet wide. The water is so clear that 
one can see a button dropped to the bottom. 
At certain angles one sees beautiful pris- 
matic hues. The shadow of your boat is 
plainly perceptible on the bottom. You 
seem to be floating in the air. Near by 
were some of the bones of a mastodon which 
had been taken from the spring. The re- 
mainder of the skeleton had been sent to 
Barnum's Museum. 

On April 2 we bade adieu to our good 
friends of Quincy, not one of whom have I 
ever seen since. We drove to Chatta- 
hoochee over a dreadful road, and in the 
evening took the steamer Palmetto for 
Columbus, where we arrived the next day 
at 1 P.M. The river with its precipitous 
banks largely covered with cypresses was of 
more interest than we had expected. Co- 
lumbus was a prosperous city of six thousand 
inhabitants. Several cotton mills were in 
process of construction. 

The next morning at 2 a.m., the usual 
hour in the South for stages to start, we 
set out for Opelika. Hardly had we seated 
ourselves when one of the two women pas- 
sengers said to the other, "Wall, Poll, I 
s'pose we might as well begin to rub snuff. 
You got your bottle." Poll produced it and 
they began this disgusting habit of rubbing 

[70] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

a little wooden swab dipped in snuff in 
their mouths. The odor of the smoke of 
the lamps and a fresh wind furnished us 
some relief. I may as well say in this con- 
nection that in Florida the young women 
of good breeding were often addicted to 
this habit, though in private. On this 
journey we met with a remarkable negro. 
He had purchased his freedom. He was on 
his way to release from arrest for drunken- 
ness his former owner to whom he had fre- 
quently shown this kindness. He was the 
builder of a very long bridge which we 
crossed. We were told that when the 
builders of the capitol at Montgomery 
were puzzled in framing the dome, he was 
called in to extricate them from their 
trouble. 

From Opelika we went seventy miles by 
rail to Montgomery. The view from the 
Capitol to the north extended over an in- 
terminable forest, clothed in the delicate 
green of early spring. The city lies in a 
semi-circle of hills, and appeared to be 
fairly prosperous. As we were passing 
some negroes, one asked, "How's de peoples 
up de country?" '*0h, dey's all extant," 
replied another. We gathered from con- 
versation that the sentiment in Montgom- 
ery and the adjacent country was by no 

[71] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

means unanimous for secession, though the 
subject was under discussion. 

We proceeded by steamer to Mobile, a 
sail of a day and a half, through rather tame 
and monotonous scenery. As we passed 
the steamboats at the wharves in Mobile, 
one of our negro men would lead off in a 
song and the negroes on the other boats 
would join in a chorus. This made an 
animated scene of our arrival. We spent 
a happy day with some good friends, but 
were obliged to hurry on to New Orleans. 
The business, mainly in cotton, of Mobile 
had been declining, but they hoped that 
the completion of the Mobile & Ohio 
Railroad would revive it. The harbour 
was so shallow that much of the cotton for 
export had to be carried thirty miles in 
lighters. 

We went by steamer to New Orleans. 
At that time, steamers and sailing ships, 
foreign and American, crowded the levee 
for miles. The products of the Mississippi 
Valley lay piled in confusion as far as the 
eye could see. Thousands of negroes were 
busy loading drays and ships, singing as 
they toiled. No other such scene could be 
witnessed in America. The visit to the 
foreign quarters, the mingling of French and 
Spanish with the English, the cemeteries 

[72] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

with their peculiar tombs, the thousand 
sights which characterize a European city, 
were all strange and fascinating to us. 
Visiting the steamer Peytona to bid fare- 
well to some friends, we had our first and 
only view of Henry Clay who was depart- 
ing for home on that boat. As was the 
custom, a concourse of ladies were kissing 
him good-bye. That proved, I think, to be 
his last visit to New Orleans. We dined 
with Jacob Barker, the most distinguished 
merchant in the city, who once won a 
famous law-suit, which turned on the con- 
tention raised by him that a whale is not a 
fish but a mammal. 

On ascending the river we passed two or 
three large crevasses through which the 
water, pouring like a river, had flooded the 
country as far as we could see, and to the 
depth of several feet. The people had fled 
from their houses in boats. We stopped at 
Baton Rouge long enough to visit the capi- 
tol, not quite completed, and the state 
prison, whose inmates were employed in a 
cotton mill established within the walls. 
We continued on the steamer we took at 
Baton Rouge until we reached Paducah. 
There we heard a Judge charging the jury 
in a very original manner. He always re- 
ferred to the Court as "She," and inveighed 

[73] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

against demagogues " honey f ogling the 
people." 

We went by steamer to Nashville. We 
found the views of the bluffs on the river in 
refreshing contrast to the low, level, and 
monotonous banks of the Mississippi. The 
city has a fine site in the hills overlooking 
the Cumberland River. State prisoners 
were erecting the Capitol. They had been 
at work on it six years, and it was supposed 
that three years more would be required to 
complete it. 

From Nashville we went by stage coach 
to the Mammoth Cave. We spent two 
days in exploring that most famous of all 
caves. A tedious stage coach journey took 
us from the Cave to Louisville. After a 
brief visit with friends, one of them our 
college classmate, Reuben T. Durrett, since 
well known as a scholar, learned in the his- 
tory of Kentucky, we took the steamer for 
Cincinnati. 

We spent Sunday in that city. By 
chance we went to the church of which Dr. 
Willis Lord, once pastor of my ow^n church 
in Providence, was the pastor and heard 
an excellent sermon from him. On climb- 
ing the hill back of the city, we gained a 
view of Professor Mitchell's Observatory, 
of which years afterwards I heard him 

[74] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

speak so frequently. He used to relate 
with pride, that in a hundred days from his 
departure for Europe he returned with his 
telescope. Few astronomers could tell in so 
eloquent language as he did of the revela- 
tions made to him by his instrument. 

We left Cincinnati by coach at 4 o'clock 
A.M. for Dublin, Indiana, to visit the Van- 
uxems, Quaker relatives of Mr. Hazard. 
This drive took us through a most fertile 
country, inhabited by an industrious and 
thrifty people. When I saw a white man 
actually sawing his own wood, I felt like 
going to shake hands with him. We had 
come to a land where honest physical toil 
was honourable. The beautiful beech and 
maple groves of eastern Indiana, having no 
undergrowth, were charming to our eyes. 
We spent a week most pleasantly with the 
simple, hospitable, prosperous people of 
Dublin and Cambridge, and returned to 
Cincinnati in a long day's drive to take the 
steamer for Pittsburg. 

No scenery we had beheld was so enchant- 
ing as that on the voyage up the Ohio. 
We looked up our friends, the Randolphs 
and Tanners, and passed a pleasant day 
with them. We made the journey to 
Johnstown by canal boat, a most agreeable 
mode of traveUing through the romantic 

[75] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

valleys. At Johnstown we were drawn up 
an inclined plane and started by rail for 
Philadelphia. We called upon our old 
friends. I left Mr. Hazard there and 
reached home on May 22, after an absence 
of seven months and eighteen days, rein- 
vigorated in health. 



[76] 



in. 

WORK IN CIVIL ENGINEERING AND 
STUDY IN EUROPE 

The trouble with my throat described on 
page 40, really changed the whole plan of 
my life, as I had then marked it out. I 
had formed the purpose of studying for the 
ministry. Some of my most intimate college 
friends were already pursuing theological 
studies in the Andover Theological Semi- 
nary, where I used to visit them. I had 
formed the acquaintance of the eminent 
Professors, Park, Edwards, and Phelps. I 
had even gone so far as to engage my room 
for the autumn. But the trouble with my 
throat continued for weeks so obstinate 
that I deemed it wise to consult a noted 
Boston speciahst on diseases of the throat. 
He informed me that I must not indulge in 
the hope of being able to pursue any pro- 
fession in which I should have to speak in 
public. He said it would not be prudent 
for me even to attempt to teach. He ad- 
vised me to choose some out-door employ- 
ment. This announcement was a bitter 
disappointment. It seemed for a time that 

[77] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

every door to a career in which I had any 
interest was shut in my face. 

I asked myself what out-of-door employ- 
ment is there in which I can profit by the 
education I have had. I decided that civil 
engineering gave the best promise of ful- 
filling that condition. Fortunately some of 
my friends knew Mr. E. S. Chesboro, a 
former resident of Providence, and then 
City Engineer of Boston. In answer to 
their inquiries he expressed a willingness to 
take me into his ofiice. I reported to him 
for duty in August, 1851. The work on 
the Cochituate water supply in Boston was 
not then completed, and I was employed 
mainly on that. In those days few men in 
the engineering ofiices had received a tech- 
nical or even a mathematical education in 
the schools. They had usually worked 
their way up from the position of rodman, 
and they accomplished what they did by 
rule-of -thumb work or by the mechanical use 
of formulae the rationale or origin of which 
they did not know. It proved that I was 
the only one in the oflSce from the chief 
down who had studied the Calculus, and as 
a real knowledge of some of the formulae 
for water problems involved that study, I 
presently found them turned over to me. 
As one recalls how slender were the op- 

[78] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

portunities in those days for training in 
engineering studies and observes the large 
number of excellent engineering schools in 
our country, one may say that in no branch 
of education has there been more rapid 
and helpful development than in that of 
engineering in all its applications. 

The Grand Trunk road from Montreal to 
Boston was opened while I was in the 
office. I assisted in making an immense 
map, which was stretched in the tent on the 
Common when the celebration of this event 
was held. Lord Elgin, the Governor-gen- 
eral of Canada, and President Fillmore were 
present. I remember that as Mr. Fillmore 
was said to be unaccustomed to riding, I 
saw two negroes holding his horse carefully 
by the bits as the animal slowly walked in 
the procession. We all agreed that he was 
a very handsome man, but not much of a 
cavalier. 

At one time complaint was made of the 
impurity of the Cochituate water in Boston. 
Mr. Chesboro invited me to walk with him 
through about two miles of the conduit, 
from which the water had been partially 
drawn off, somewhere west of Cambridge. 
And there on this subterranean excursion I 
made the acquaintance of Professor Hors- 
ford of Harvard, whose friendship I after- 

[79] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

wards enjoyed through his hfe. The walk- 
ing on the bottom of an egg-shaped conduit 
in which about a foot of water had been 
left was not altogether easy or agreeable. 
It was decided that some vegetable deposit 
had found its way into the water. 

One day near the end of November, Mr. 
Chesboro assigned to me the task of making 
a survey and a map of Boston Common, 
showing every path and every tree on it. 
This was to be made at the request of some 
dweller on Beacon Street, who for many 
years had daily walked around the Com- 
mon. I began in the corner just in front 
of the State House. While I was at work 
I received a letter from my friend Hazard 
saying that he was still having trouble with 
his lungs and that his father had decided 
to send him to Southern Europe for the 
winter and wished me to accompany him. 
He begged me to come to his home immedi- 
ately and confer with him. I did so, and 
it was decided that we should sail at once. 
I went back to Boston, and took my leave 
of Mr. Chesboro, to whose kindness I was 
greatly indebted. So ended my work in 
engineering. After a brief visit to my 
parents, I joined Mr. Hazard and we sailed 
from New York for Havre on the steamship 
Arago, Captain Lines, on December 13. 

[80] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

We had only thirteen passengers. Among 
them were Mr. Spence of Baltimore, after- 
wards our Minister to Turkey, George W. 
Kendall, editor of the New Orleans Pica- 
yune, who greatly enlivened our voyage by 
his wit, and one typical specimen of the 
self-rehant Connecticut Yankee. This last 
was on his wedding trip. His opportunities 
for education had been hmited. But he was 
daunted by no obstacles of travel in foreign 
parts. By some means he had persuaded 
himself that although he knew no French, 
he could make a French word out of an 
English word if he pronounced it very 
loudly and added the termination bus. So 
he would accost one of the waiters who were 
all French, thus: ^'Gargon, bring me some 
cheese-ihus/' And in fact he generally got 
it. He travelled at such a pace that by the 
time we reached Florence he had been all 
through the East and was on his way home. 
We met him in the street in Florence one 
morning with one-half of his face covered 
with lather and inquired of him what had 
happened to him. With much vehemence 
he said: *'I wanted to be shaved. I went 
into a shop which had a barber's pole in 
front and sat down. The barber soon gave 
me to understand that he bled people, but 
did not shave them. So I went to another 

[81] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

shop. The barber there lathered my face 
and began to shave me with a razor so dull 
that I snatched it from his hand and told 
him I could make a razor sharper than that 
on the sole of my boot. So here I am look- 
ing for another barber." We asked him how 
he had contrived to get all over southern and 
eastern Europe so rapidly and with no lan- 
guage but English. Holding his purse in 
one hand and his cane in the other, he 
replied, "With that purse in one hand and 
that cane in the other, and with swearing a 
little at times, I can go all over Europe." 
And I have reason to think he did. 

We arrived at Havre on December 27. 
When the pilot came aboard he astonished 
us by the announcement that by a couj) 
d'etat Louis Napoleon had taken full pos- 
session of the government, that many of the 
prominent statesmen were in prison, and 
that martial law was declared. On landing, 
Mr. Hazard and I proceeded at once to 
Rouen, where we spent a day in visiting 
the churches. We were delighted with our 
first view of the florid Gothic architecture. 
Thence we went immediately to Paris, 
where we found much excitement over the 
couf d'etat. The marks of the bullets which 
had been fired in the conflicts along the 
Boulevard des Italiens were still fresh. 

[82] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

But the places of amusement were all 
open. At the Theatre Frangais we saw 
that great actor Got in Moliere's Malade 
Imaginaire and Rachel in Phedre and the 
theatre was crowded on both nights. When 
I was in college we were, like students in 
most New England colleges, forbidden to 
attend the theatre on pain of expulsion. 
Therefore I had never before seen plays 
presented by great actors and actresses. 
Although my understanding of the lan- 
guage was imperfect, these performances 
w^ere the revelation of a new world to me.^ 

We were assured that many prominent 
men had been thrown into prison. But so 
far as we could observe, business seemed to 
be going on everywhere, and we were not 
interfered with at all. 

There was a notable service in Notre 
Dame which we attended, in which the 
Archbishop of Paris invoked the divine 
blessing on the President in his new under- 
taking. 

We also attended a reception given by 

1 1 may properly remark here that during this visit 
to Europe, I did not keep a diary, but wrote home my 
detailed letters, which were preserved until they were 
burned when my father's house was destroyed by fire. 
I depend on my present recollections for what I now write 
concerning the European journey. 

[83] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

our Consul, Mr. Goodrich, the Peter Parley, 
whose books have been the dehght of our 
childhood. He appeared to us to be the 
impersonation of the amiable, entertaining, 
child-loving Peter Parley, of whom we had 
been so fond, and he seemed much pleased 
at our acknowledgment of our great in- 
debtedness to his books. 

The weather was very damp and chilly, 
and therefore, a week after our arrival, we 
set out for Marseilles on our way to Italy. 
Having engaged our seats in the diligence, 
we went to the office at the appointed hour 
and occupied them. The diligence was 
driven to the railway station and there the 
body was lifted with passengers and bag- 
gage by a crane and deposited on a flat 
car. So we were transported to Dijon, 
where the diligence body was again lifted 
by a crane and placed on wheels. We were 
then drawn by horses to Lyons. Thence 
we were taken by rail to Marseilles. On 
our journey we saw many citizens tied to 
ropes and marching under military guard 
to prison. Everywhere there was manifest 
a feeling of high tension. 

A young lieutenant in uniform journeyed 
with us from Lyons to Marseilles. On 
arrival there a customs ofiicer came to ex- 
amine our baggage. The lieutenant refused 

[84] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

to allow the officer to touch his port- 
manteau. When the officer insisted, the 
lieutenant drew his pistol and forced a re- 
treat. After the officer left, the lieutenant 
turned to us with a laugh and said, "The 
pistol was not loaded." Leges silent inter 
arma. 

From Marseilles we went by diligence via 
Draguignan to Genoa, and thence by sea to 
Naples. We spent a few days there, of 
course visiting Pompeii and ascending Ve- 
suvius. We met our old teacher. Professor 
Gammell, who was on his wedding trip with 
his wife, the daughter of Robert H. Ives. 
He proposed to us to join them in the 
journey to Rome in a private carriage. In 
those days of few railways this was a charm- 
ing method of travel. The vetturino, 
usually a Swiss, furnished the carriage and 
horses, stopped wherever one wished on the 
journey, paid all the hotel bills, and spared 
one all the trouble of bargaining with the 
natives. As there was a railway as far as 
Capua, Mr. Hazard and I went ahead to 
visit that place of so much historic interest. 
We drove out towards evening to the vil- 
lage near which Hannibal was said to have 
encamped, and found a most interesting 
fete going on. The peasants in their pic- 
turesque costumes were dancing on the 

[85] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

green. On our return to the hotel we were 
told that we were fortunate in escaping 
robbery, since that village was the resort 
at such times of some desperate characters. 
Mr. and Mrs. Gammell joined us on the 
next day, and we had a delightful three 
days' journey to Rome. The approach to 
the city from that side is far more pic- 
turesque than from Civitavecchia or from 
Florence. We spent six weeks in the high- 
est enjoyment I ever experienced in all my 
travels. Fresh from our college studies, 
with Horace in the pocket as a guide-book, 
every step revealed to us some object of the 
deepest interest. At night we returned to 
our rooms to read afresh of all we had seen. 
Almost literally we could say that we 
travelled and observed all day and then 
studied all night. Such delights could 
hardly come to one later in life. Subse- 
quent visits to Rome never yielded a full 
repetition of the first experiences. Rome 
was also more interesting then to the young 
American traveller than it is now because 
it was completely under ecclesiastical con- 
trol, and the streets were always gay with 
processions, celebrations, church festivals 
of one kind and another. We saw Pius IX 
(to whom the liberals everywhere were still 
looking as friendly to their cause) on two 

[86] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

occasions, a man with so benignant a face 
that no one who saw him could expect from 
him anything but benevolence and love. We 
first saw him in the Sistine Chapel on Ash 
Wednesday, when with the impressive cere- 
monial of his church he placed the ashes 
on the heads of the cardinals and on that 
of the Duke of Norfolk, the great Eng- 
lish Catholic. I remember distinctly the 
marked face of Cardinal Antonelli who be- 
came the dominant adviser of the Pope. 
He had brilliant eyes, a swarthy complexion, 
and an expression that put you on your 
guard against his strategy. One act in the 
service produced a comical effect on us who 
had never witnessed the ceremonial before. 
When the Cardinals kneeled as a prayer 
was offered, a page stepped behind each 
and twisted the tail of his gown into a knot, 
exactly as we tie a horse's tail into a knot 
in muddy weather. 

One morning with a large assembly we 
stood in St. Peter's, waiting for the Pope 
to appear before the high altar for a great 
ceremonial. Distinguished representatives 
from all civilized lands were present. At 
last the doors from the Vatican approach 
swung open, the song from the choir broke 
upon the ear, and the Holy Father appeared 
borne in a sort of palanquin. As the atten- 

[87] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

tion of the multitude was absorbed by the 
scene, a man standing by my side pointed 
to a beautiful Italian boy near us and said, 
"It is hard, is it not, to realize that this 
little body is a temple greater than that in 
which we stand?" 

A drive to Tivoli and the sight of the 
"Praeceps Anio" gave us one of our most 
delightful days. 

The visit to Rome brought to me the first 
real revelation of the arts of sculpture 
and painting. The galleries and churches 
opened to me a new world. One can not 
describe what it was to a person who had 
no conception of art except what he had 
derived from the sight of Powers' Greek 
Slave and copies in private houses of two 
or three classical masterpieces of painting, 
to have suddenly spread before him the 
immeasurable artistic wealth of Rome, 
with full liberty to gaze upon it at will and 
to attain to some worthy appreciation of its 
wealth. Life could never again be quite 
what it was before. Of all the gifts of 
Rome to me that was the greatest. 

During our stay in Rome the diligence on 
the journey between Rome and Florence was 
several times stopped by highwaymen, and 
the passengers were robbed of their money, 
watches, and jewels. It was said that the 

[88] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

robbers were for the most part men of good 
families. Certainly they showed good breed- 
ing. They usually begged the passengers 
to fear no bodily harm. They said that 
they regretted extremely that the stress of 
the revolutionary period had forced them to 
resort to this means of gaining a livelihood. 
They politely helped the ladies to alight, 
and after receiving their jewels and money 
politely handed them back to the carriage. 

We four, who found the travelling from 
Naples with the vetturino so pleasant, em- 
ployed him to take us to Florence. We 
were six days on the journey, going by 
Perugia, and a most agreeable journey it 
was. We encountered no highwaymen. 

Of course the galleries at Florence chiefly 
absorbed our attention. But the pohtical 
situation was extremely interesting. The 
Austrians were in possession of Tuscany. 
They were intensely hated by the Itahans. 
We had rooms on the great Piazza del Gran 
Duca. 

Twice a week Austrian troops assembled 
there and their attractive bands discoursed 
most charming music. But as the troops 
passed along the streets the shutters were 
closed and on the Piazza not a Florentine 
could be seen. The foreigners and the Aus- 
trians had the music to themselves. On the 

[89] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

occasion of a church festival we saw the 
Grand Duke and members of his family in 
garb of penitence, marching at the head of 
the procession. But on his approach the 
streets were deserted. 

We went via Bologna and Padua to 
Venice where we spent some daj^s in that 
delight which Venice brings to every travel- 
ler. The city seems to me to have changed 
less since that time than any other Italian 
city of importance. 

We sailed thence to Trieste and then 
made the long journey by diligence, travel- 
hng day and night, to Gratz, which was even 
then a flourishing, manufacturing city, 
though we like most Americans had hardly 
known of its existence. From Gratz we 
were able to go by rail to Vienna. Partly 
because we had friends there, we spent 
several days in the Austrian capital. 

We were fortunate enough to be there on 
what was called the Day of the Three Em- 
perors. There was a military celebration 
of the suppression of the rebellion of Hun- 
gary. The three sovereigns present were the 
Austrian Emperor, Francis Joseph, the Rus- 
sian Emperor, Nicholas, and the Prussian 
King, William. Fifteen thousand troops 
were assembled on the Glacis. The Em- 
peror Nicholas took command and ordered 

[90] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

the manoeuvres. He looked the Emperor 
more than any man I ever saw. Of the 
gigantic Romanoff stature, of commanding 
mien, he sat upon his powerful horse as 
though ready in a joust to meet any foe.^ 
As after the manoeuvres weve ended the 
troops marched through theprir;cipal streets, 
they w^ere preceded not only 'by the sover- 
eigns and a large number of generals but 
also by the ladies of the Imperial Austrian 
family in their open carriages. Though 
we young Americans, never having seen so 
many men under arms, were impressed by 
the brilhant display, yet our sympathy with 
the Hungarians whom the Austrian govern- 
ment had been enabled only by Russian 
help to defeat, led us to look on with an in- 
ward protest, especially as we had seen the 
breaches in the city walls which the Hun- 
garian revolutionists had made with their 
cannon as they were on the point of gaining 
their independence. 

In these later years, when the affection- 
ate loyalty of the Austrians to Francis 

^ On the day before this parade we visited the Imperial 
stables. Noticing one horse standing in his stable with 
two heavy sacks on his back, we were told that he was 
to bear the Emperor Nicholas, and was in training for 
the unaccustomed load, as the Emperor weighed two 
hundred and forty pounds. 

[91] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Joseph has apparently saved the Empire 
from dissolution, I have often recalled the 
statements made to me by a highly intelli- 
gent Viennese during this visit. He said 
that the young Emperor who had recently 
come to the throne was really hated then 
by the populace for his cruel and over- 
bearing manner. He gave as an illustration 
the statement that a student crossing the 
Glacis in a snow storm with his head down 
did not see the Emperor who was passing, 
and so did not salute him, and that the 
Emperor was so affronted that he caused 
the innocent offender to be flogged. 
Whether this report was true, I cannot 
say. But that it could be circulated in- 
dicated a feeling utterly different from that 
which his subjects now cherish towards 
him. 

While at Vienna I received a letter from 
President Wayland, offering me as I might 
prefer either the Chair of Civil Engineering 
or that of the Modern Languages in Brown 
University, with permission to remain 
abroad a year and a half for the purpose of 
study. After deliberation, I decided to 
accept the Chair of Modern Languages. 
My throat had so far regained its strength 
that I thought I could venture to try the 
experiment of teaching. 

[92] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

We made brief visits at Prague, Dresden, 
Berlin, and Cologne on our way to Paris. 
Here Mr. Hazard left me on June 10, 1852, 
and returned home via England. I began 
the search for a teacher of French. After 
a httle I had the good fortune to make the 
acquaintance of Monsieur Jansen who had 
once been a Professor in a Lycee, but had 
been thrown out of office owing to his 
radical republicanisn, He was a guileless, 
scholarly man, without much skill in mak- 
ing his way in the world, especially in the 
troublous times which had come to France. 
He detested Louis Napoleon and all his fol- 
lowers and believed that the eyes of spies 
w^ere always upon him. He had a charming 
wife, one of the best type of the intelligent, 
well-bred, frugal woman of the middle 
class, and a diffident gentle daughter of 
eighteen years. Into this charming house- 
hold I was permitted to come as a boarder 
and a pupil. It was a surprising revelation 
to me who, like most young Americans, had 
formed my ideas of French domestic hfe 
from sensational stories of Parisian adven- 
tures, to see the beautiful simpHcity of this 
quiet and virtuous French home. I soon 
learned that this was not an exceptional 
home. Perhaps in no particular have Eng- 
lish and Americans been so far astray in 

[93] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

their judgments of the French people as in 
respect to the purity of their domestic hfe. 
Monsieur Jansen lived in Passy, on the 
Avenue de St. Cloud, just outside of the 
Arc de Triomphe de I'Etoile. It was an 
easy stroll to the Bois de Boulogne, whither 
I often went with my books. Frequently 
with the family I went on a picnic to St. 
Cloud or some other attractive spot. On 
Sundays I usually went to the Church of the 
Oratoire, where I heard some of the most 
eloquent Protestant preachers. One pe- 
culiar, but rather commendable custom of 
the preachers, which I have never seen 
spoken of in books, I noticed with interest. 
Their style was picturesque or dramatic. 
After an eloquent passage which closed one 
division or head of the sermon, the preacher 
would pause to clear his throat or use his 
handkerchief, and the whole congregation 
availed themselves of that opportunity to do 
the same thing. Then as he proceeded, he 
was not interrupted by coughing. In due 
time he paused again for the same purpose, 
and the congregation imitated him once 
more. Occasionally I went to the Sor- 
bonne or the College de France and heard 
lectures. But in the main I gave my at- 
tention to writing French and conversing 
and reading French literature. One inter- 

[94] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

esting and instructive diversion was after 
reading French history to go to Versailles 
and see the historical pictures which adorn 
the walls. 

In October, 1852, I left Paris for Ger- 
many. I travelled through Holland and 
went to Braunschweig to study German. I 
found an excellent home in the house of 
Herr Sack, the clerk of the Circuit Court, 
an elderly man w4io had fought in the Battle 
of Waterloo and was a somewhat noted 
local antiquary. His eldest daughter, who 
was a teacher in a private school and was a 
scholar of large reading in English as well as 
in German literature, became my teacher. 
She was most competent. I have always 
regarded myself as so greatly indebted to 
her that I continued correspondence with 
her until her death in 1907. I know few 
American women who can recite so many 
fine passages from English poets as she 
could. I was impressed by this and other 
facts with the excellent literary training 
which the German schools gave their girls. 

One book from the father's pen was a 
striking illustration of the German thor- 
oughness (Griindlichkeit), which I had 
occasion so often to remark in German 
writers. In early times the Bruns wickers 
of wealth and rank placed elaborate family 

[95] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

coats-of-arms on their chimneys in con- 
spicuous positions. Herr Sack found in 
these with their mottoes a valuable con- 
tribution to the history of the city. So he 
wrote a book on the History of the Chim- 
neys of Brunsw^ick. It was divided into 
two parts. In order to lay a proper foun- 
dation for his interpretation of the sym- 
bols, he devoted the first part to the history 
of chimneys in Greece and Rome and there 
reached the conclusion that the Greeks and 
Romans had no chimneys. Not till he had 
done this was he prepared to discuss the 
History of Chimneys in Brunswick. 

So far as I could learn I was the first 
American ever known in Brunswick. One 
South American from Bogota arrived there 
before me. But as people generally knew 
nothing of Bogota, he used in company to 
draw near to me, throw his arm across my 
shoulder, and say somewhat ostentatiously, 
"Ach! wir sind Amerikaner." 

I was invited to join a club of German 
gentlemen who met occasionally to speak 
English and who wished me to correct their 
expressions when necessary. It so hap- 
pened that for some time the only member 
to whom English was vernacular was a 
mechanical engineer from London, con- 
nected with the railway. He was illiterate 

[96] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

and his speech was pure cockney. I was 
soon embarrassed by their remarking the 
differences between his speech and mine, 
and asking for explanations. These I gave 
when he was not present. 

'* Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Mrs. Stowe 
appeared while I was in Brunswick, and was 
read with great eagerness. But many of my 
acquaintances were puzzled by Topsy's 
English, and could find no help in their 
dictionaries. For a time I could scarcely 
take a walk on the street without being 
accosted, occasionally by strangers to whom 
I had been pointed out as an American, for 
aid in interpreting the negro dialect. 

In this connection I am tempted to de- 
scribe an adventure which befell me in a 
school to which English and Irish girls of 
good families had been sent to learn Ger- 
man. The proprietor of the school was a 
relative of the Sacks with whom I was liv- 
ing. So I was invited with them to a 
Christmas supper at the school. I was 
seated at the table at a safe distance from 
the girls who appeared to be from fourteen 
to eighteen years of age. At the close of 
the supper I was surprised to receive, 
through the host, a request from the girls 
that I would say a few words in American. 
It had not occurred to me that they could 

[97] 

8 



REMINISCENCES OF 

be ignorant of the fact that Enghsh is our 
vernacular. But as it appeared that they 
were, I thought an innocent trick was allow- 
able. So I arose and made a speech in what 
in my childhood we boys called "hog 
Latin." It consists in beginning a word 
with the last syllable and then recurring 
to the first: e.g., the word "German" 
would appear as "man-o-ger." Of course 
there was resemblance enough in some 
words to the real words so that they would 
catch a little of what I was saying. But 
they were much bewildered. And the Ger- 
man hearers were even more so. I sat 
down amid hearty applause. The young 
ladies sent up an expression of thanks. I 
never explained the trick to my German 
friends until I went to Brunswick forty 
years later. 

The tenor singer in the Brunswick Opera 
Company and his wife occupied a room 
directly under mine. He was a very genial, 
jolly fellow, and I used often to walk with 
him. Through him I made the acquain- 
tance in his rooms of his associates in the 
Opera Company. As the members of the 
company hold permanent positions in a 
German city, I met them at times in general 
society. They presented to me a new side 
of life. I found them very companionable 

[98] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

and entertaining, but was surprised to ob- 
serve that most of them had very Hmited 
attainments beyond their professional train- 
ing. The breath of their hfe seemed to be 
pubhe applause of their performances, and 
perhaps as a consequence of this they were 
very jealous of each other's success. Most 
of them mingled with their neighbours 
without attracting more especial attention 
than other respectable citizens. 

I spent a pleasant afternoon w^ith Herr 
Sack, visiting the great hbrary at Wolfen- 
buttel, then in charge of an aged librarian 
who, though utterly bhnd, could lay his 
hand on any book he sought in the great 
collection. 

It was on the whole a most profitable and 
enjoyable winter that I spent in Brunswick. 
In April, 1853, 1 left the circle of friends, by 
whom I had been most hospitably received, 
with sincere regret, in order to attend lec- 
tures on modern German hterature at the 
University of Berlin. 

I took lodgings near the middle of the 
city. I was disappointed in applying at the 
University to find that there was no course 
to be given on the subject I wished to 
study. I sent to several Universities and 
could learn of no such course except at 
Munich. While I was busy in this quest, 

[99] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

and was seeking to procure from the city 
authorities the ordinary permission to oc- 
cupy lodgings, I was surprised to be in- 
formed by the pohce officers who had 
received my passport that I could not 
receive that permission in the usual form. 
On the contrary I was directed to report 
twice a week in person at the police office. 
In answer to my inquiry for the reason of 
this extraordinary demand, I was told that 
revolutionists with the spirit of 1848 were 
busy, that bombs and other munitions had 
been found in the attic of a storehouse, and 
that Germans bearing American passports 
were supposed to be coming to town to en- 
gage in law^less enterprises. "Well," I 
said, *'how does that concern me?" "Well, 
we thought you might be one of these Ger- 
mans." "It is very flattering," I rephed, 
"to be regarded by you as a German. W^ill 
you not be good enough to tell me why you 
have taken me for a German.^" "Well," 
was the reply, "you have a square head and 
light hair and complexion, in short, look 
like a German." "But," I rejoined, "you 
must see that I do not speak your language 
like a German. I have been in your coun- 
try only a few months." "Yes," said the 
official, "but the foreign accent could be 
assumed." 

[100] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

I could not argue against "Caesar with 
his ten legions." After a week's sojourn 
under these conditions, reflecting that only 
in Munich could I find the lectures I wanted, 
I resolved to go there. So I went to the 
police office and demanded my passport, 
vised for Munich. To my surprise and to 
my temporary satisfaction the oflScer could 
not find it. I saw at once that there I had 
him at my mercy. In those days a pass- 
port was regarded in official circles as such 
a sacrosanct document that a police official 
could hardly commit a more serious offence 
than to lose it. So I assumed the menac- 
ing air, and told him that if the passport w^as 
not at my room vised within three hours I 
would report the case to the American 
Charge for complaint to the Government. 
It was delivered to me within the time and 
I set out for Munich. 

On the way I spent a day or two with 
intense delight at Nuremburg, in which it 
was so easy to reproduce in imagination the 
mediaeval life of Hans Sachs' time. I also 
stopped at Augsburg. 

At Munich the police office at first de- 
clined to give me permission to reside, be- 
cause in my application I wrote out my 
middle name in full, while my passport 
contained merely the initial letter of my 

[101] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

middle name. It required an argument to 
convince the stupid official of my identity. 

One of my first pleasures in Munich was 
that of hearing the great chemist Liebig 
lecture. Of all the professors I heard, he 
was the most attractive in manner. It 
proved to be his son-in-law, Moritz Carriere, 
who gave the course in modern German 
literature which I came to hear. I wanted 
especially to listen to discourses on Lessing, 
Goethe, and Schiller. As I had six weeks 
at my disposal, and Carriere was announced 
for three lectures a week, I hoped I might 
get some valuable instruction. He was an 
excellent lecturer. But alas! the old Ger- 
man "Grtindlichkeit," if not so striking as 
that of Herr Sack in his "History of the 
Chimneys of Brunswick," proved fatal. 
For he began back with the Germans of 
whom I had read in the Germania of 
Tacitus, and in my six weeks had only got 
down towards the modern times as far as 
the translation of the Bible by Ulfilas. 
However, I heard other excellent lectures 
on the Ancient Classics, and enjoyed much 
the visits to the galleries of art. My so- 
journ was not without profit and pleasure. 

From Munich I went to Zurich. After a 
short stay there I crossed the lake and 
walked over the Brunig Pass to Thun and 

[102] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

Berne, and travelled thence by diligence to 
Geneva and thence by diligence and rail to 
Paris. I received a hearty welcome from 
my old friends, the Jansens, with whom I 
remained about six weeks. During this 
sojourn in Paris I had the pleasure of meet- 
ing at dinner at the house of a friend, Mon- 
sieur Sainte-Beuve, the great critic, whose 
writings had greatly attracted me. He was 
most genial and interesting. He was of 
medium height, inclined to embonpoint, and 
for some reason which I should be puzzled 
to explain reminded me of the picture I had 
always formed to myself of the poet Horace. 
From Paris in July I made a hurried 
journey through England, spending a week 
in London, then passing by Stratford, War- 
wick, Oxford, and York, to Edinburgh and 
Glasgow and to Liverpool, whence I sailed 
on July 29 for Philadelphia. We had a 
wonderfully smooth voyage. The steamer 
soon sailed on her return voyage, and was 
never heard from. I stopped in New York, 
where the first of our national expositions 
was being held. I remember seeing a good 
farmer and his wife gazing on the casts 
of Thorwaldsen's Christ and the Apostles, 
and concluding after some discussion that 
they were the Presidents of the United 
States. 

[ 103 ] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

I reached my father's house in Scituate 
after an absence of nearly two years. I 
learned that both my maternal grandparents 
had died since my last letters had reached 
me abroad. I was especially grieved at the 
death of my grandmother. It was from 
her that my dear mother inherited most of 
her traits. 



[104] 



IV 

THE PROFESSORSHIP IN BROWN 
UNIVERSITY AND EDITORSHIP 
OF THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL 

I WAS twenty -four years of age when I 
entered on the duties of my professorship. 
I was the youngest member of the Faculty. 
Most of the professors had been my teach- 
ers. Professor Robinson P. Dunn, who had 
recently been called to the Chair of Rhetoric 
and English Literature, was only a few 
years my senior. He became at once my 
intimate companion and a most congenial 
associate in my studies. I was well aware 
that my preparation for my special work 
was less adequate than I could have de- 
sired. I purposed to return to Europe for 
further study as soon as I had liquidated 
the debt I had incurred in my sojourn in 
Europe. I was particularly desirous of 
studying the Italian language and litera- 
ture. I had become deeply interested in 
tracing the influence of the leading Euro- 
pean literatures on each other. I soon wrote 
articles for the North American Review, 

[105] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

under the encouragement of its scholarly 
editor, Dr. Andrew P. Peabody, pointing 
out to some extent the interaction of the 
French, German, and English literatures. 
I cherished the hope that on a visit to 
Europe I might write a book of some 
worth on the reciprocal influence of the 
chief literatures on each other. Like many 
another dream of early years that has re- 
mained only a dream. But, in my teach- 
ing, which was necessarily elementary, since 
most of my students began the study of the 
modern languages with me, I strove and 
not without fair success, I hope, to imbue 
them with some enthusiasm for the study 
of the great authors to whom I introduced 
them. 

It was an interesting period in the his- 
tory of the University when I entered upon 
my official connection with it. President 
Wayland, who was a pioneer in the reform 
of our traditional collegiate system, had 
induced the Corporation to make important 
innovations. As early as 1842 he had pub- 
lished a small book entitled "Thoughts on 
the Present Collegiate System in the United 
States," in which he had pointed out what 
he regarded as some of the defects in that 
system. He maintained that the colleges 
were not furnishing the education which 

[106] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

was needed to meet our wants, especially 
that they were not training men in science 
and its applications to life. The book at- 
tracted some attention, but not so much as 
it deserved. 

Further observation and reflection con- 
firmed him in the opinion that a change in 
the organization of our colleges ought to be 
attempted. In a report to the Trustees of 
Brown University in 1850 he so impressed 
them with his views that they raised a fund, 
large for those days, for the reorganiza- 
tion of the work of their institution in 
accordance with his ideas. He provided 
for more generous work in the sciences and 
in modern languages and in engineering 
and large liberty in the election of studies. 
He really opened the way for that broaden- 
ing and liberalizing of collegiate study 
which in a few years prevailed to a con- 
siderable extent in every American college 
of standing. He was the pioneer who 
broke away from the old traditional path, 
which our colleges had followed from the 
seventeenth century, and pointed them to 
the road which they are now all following. 
The credit which is his due for this service 
he has not always received. The immedi- 
ate consequence of the adoption of what 
was called the ''new system" had been a 

[107] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

large increase in the attendance, and a cer- 
tain enthusiasm among the students about 
this new departure. This was favourable 
to the work in my department. Extension 
lectures, which have since been introduced 
by some universities in this country and in 
England in order to bring university in- 
struction to the masses, were given by 
Professor Chase to the jewellers and by Pro- 
fessor Caswell to the mechanics in Provi- 
dence. The college which had not been in 
close touch with the people of the State 
was brought nearer to them by lyceum lec- 
tures given by members of the Faculty. I 
went out frequently to lecture on "Life in 
Europe" and on education. But in spite 
of the enthusiasm with which Dr. Wayland 
and some of his friends gave a new impulse 
to the college, serious difficulties were en- 
countered in carrying into effect his cher- 
ished plans. Some of the Professors had 
not much sympathy with his ideas of re- 
form. The funds raised to carry the "new 
system" into operation, though regarded as 
adequate w^ien they were raised, proved 
insufficient. The President finally became 
discouraged and resigned his place in 1855. 
He was succeeded by Dr. Sears, who was 
friendly to the traditional ideas of college 
work rather than to Dr. Wayland's. There- 

[ 108 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

fore from the time of his accession to office 
the spirit of collegiate reform visibly lan- 
guished. But the impulse which had been 
given to the college was not w^holly lost. 
In the classes which I had the pleasure of 
teaching, were not a few whose subsequent 
careers reflected much honour on themsleves 
and on the University. Most conspicuous 
among them are Richard Olney of the class 
of 1856, and John Hay, of the class of 1858. 
Both gave marked promise. Mr. Olney, 
af terw^ards Attorney-general and then Secre- 
tary of State of the United States, showed 
the traits of mind which characterize the 
profound lawyer. For Mr. Hay one would 
have predicted a briUiant Hterary future. 
I have often said that he was the most 
felicitous translator I ever met in my 
classes. He wrote verses of unusual merit 
for an undergraduate. He was modest even 
to diffidence, often blushing to the roots of 
his hair when he rose to recite. In the 
years of his middle hfe, and especially after 
the production of his books on Spanish life, 
written in so picturesque a style, I used in 
common with many of his friends to regret 
that circumstances had diverted him from 
a purely literary career. But we all rejoice 
now that Providence placed him in the chair 
of Secretary of State, at a time when he could 

[109] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

be of such transcendent service to us and to 
the Eastern world. As I happened to be 
on the steamer with him when he was 
returning from the Embassy at London, I 
know from my conversation with him on 
the voyage that he entered on the duties of 
that high office with hesitancy and mis- 
giving. He said to me, ''I accepted it be- 
cause it is an office that one can hardly 
refuse." 

When I entered on the duties of the pro- 
fessorship, the curricula were so arranged 
that my students could carry the work in 
the modern languages and hteratures to a 
somewhat advanced stage, and to my great 
satisfaction. But later changes were made 
which restricted my classes to one year's 
work in each of the languages. This ele- 
mentary teaching soon became rather un- 
inspiring to me. I used to say it did not 
seem to stretch the flexor muscles of the 
mind. 

Partly owing to this fact, by an arrange- 
ment with Governor Anthony, editor and 
chief proprietor of the Providence Journal, 
while I was holding the chair in college, I 
wrote regularly leading articles, chiefly on 
foreign affairs. When he was elected to the 
United States Senate in 1858, I assumed 
responsibihty, for 1859, of all the leading 

[110] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

articles, while James S. Ham acted as 
managing editor. This attempt to carry 
both my college work and my editorial 
work did not prove satisfactory to me. 
During the year, Senator Anthony proposed 
that I should resign my position at the 
college and take the editorial charge of the 
newspaper. The college salary was very 
small and there seemed to be no prospect 
of an increase. The Journal held a very 
commanding position. The great ques- 
tions which the North and South were soon 
to submit to the dread arbitrament of war 
were already under discussion. The field 
for earnest and patriotic editorial work was 
very inviting. I decided to exchange the 
professor's chair for the editor's. 

I was called on at various times to give 
lectures in and near Providence. 1 first 
wrote out some lectures and read them. I 
soon found that this was not the most effec- 
tive mode of lecturing and moreover that it 
made too great a draught on my throat. 
So I decided to throw away manuscript. I 
thus acquired the habit of speaking with- 
out notes, which 1 have followed through 
my life with few exceptions and then 
against my wishes. Many of my speeches 
I have after delivery reduced to writing in 
order to preserve them; but the pleasure 

[111] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

and effectiveness of speaking without read- 
ing can never be equalled by reading a 
manuscript. 

It was during the period of my official 
connection with Brown University on No- 
vember 26, 1855, that I was married to 
Sarah Swoope Caswell, only daughter of 
Rev. Alexis Caswell, D.D., for many years 
Professor in the University and afterwards 
its President. This was the most fortunate 
event in my life. She was eminently fitted 
to be my helpmeet in all the various experi- 
ences of our lives. If I have achieved any 
degree of success, I owe it largely to her. 

The spirit in which Mr. Anthony had 
always conducted the Journal was that of 
courtesy towards opponents and of optim- 
ism concerning the country. Three things 
he insisted on: first, the Journal should 
be a clean paper, even in its advertisements ; 
second, the Enghsh should be pure; third, 
whatever the Journal could do for the hon- 
our, the prosperity, the glory of Rhode 
Island should be done at any sacrifice. 
For us who were left in his absence to carry 
on the work it was the tradition and the 
law to let his spirit prevail, so far as we 
could attain to it, in all departments of the 
paper. Accordingly at the end of the 
academic year, 1859-60, 1 resigned my chair 

[112] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

in the college and accepted the invitation to 
take the editorship, subject of course to the 
control of the Senator. That position I held 
from the summer of 1860 to the summer of 
1866. A more interesting and important 
period for the responsible post of con- 
ducting such a newspaper has not been 
presented in our history. Few of the news- 
papers in the country have so won the 
confidence and so controlled the opinions 
of their constituency as the Providence 
Journal under the editorship of Henry B. 
Anthony. Its opponents used to say that 
its readers considered it their political bible, 
and opened it in the morning to know what 
they ought to think. The opportunity, the 
privilege, the duty of such a journal at 
such an epoch, no one comprehended more 
thoroughly than Senator Anthony. Never 
was there a more indulgent chief. He left 
us in the ofiices the utmost liberty com- 
patible with the general policy of the paper. 
Though with my limited experience I must 
have made mistakes, I do not remember 
that he ever complained to me or ever 
criticized me, except as criticisms may 
sometimes have been gently implied in 
suggestions. 

Those who now enter the spacious offices 
of the Journal and see its large mechanical 

[113] 

9 



REMINISCENCES OF 

outfit and its force of writers, reporters, and 
clerks, will have difficulty in understanding 
on how modest a scale it was then con- 
ducted. The efficient clerk at the desk in 
the counting room was the only accountant. 
I not only wrote as a rule all the editorial 
articles, but read all the exchanges and made 
the clippings and supervised and edited all 
communications. We had no regular re- 
porter except the marine reporter who was 
a compositor and set up all the news he 
gathered. When I wished a reporter I sent 
out and found one. Two or three college 
students held themselves subject to my call 
when I could find them. After the war 
came on I engaged some young officer in 
each Rhode Island regiment and battery, 
generally one of my college pupils, to send 
correspondence from the front. Not in- 
frequently, after I had gone home at a late 
hour, the foreman of the printing office 
receiving some important war news, brought 
it to my house and I crept out of bed and 
in very slender attire wrote an article for 
him to take back. 

In respect to the questions which engaged 
public attention in the months preceding 
the war, I, hke most young men, shared the 
views of the more radical wing of the Re- 
pubhcan party in Rhode Island. But the 

[114] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

business relations of our cotton brokers and 
manufacturers in that State with the South 
had been so close that a large portion, per- 
haps a majority, of the party were very 
conservative, and ready to concede much 
to the South to avoid a conflict. Some of 
the elderly citizens of wealth and influence 
from time to time laboured earnestly with 
me to convince me of my errors and to per- 
suade me to commit the paper to a less 
dangerous policy. 

The election of a governor of the State 
was the occasion of a rupture in the party. 
A worthy grocer, Mr. Seth Padelford, by 
active canvassing secured the gubernatorial 
nomination at the Republican State Con- 
vention, and in accordance with usage the 
Journal supported him as the regular 
nominee. His nomination was distasteful 
to a large number of the prominent Re- 
publicans in Providence. They persuaded 
William Sprague, a wealthy young manu- 
facturer, to accept a nomination against 
him. One of the principal arguments which 
they adduced for opposing Padelford was 
that he had at some time given a hundred 
dollars to circulate a volume written by 
Hinton Rowan Helper of North Carohna, 
to show that on economic grounds slavery 
was injurious to the South. This was 

[115] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

loudly proclaimed as a proof that Mr. 
Padelford was an abolitionist and so un- 
friendly to the South. I believe Mr. Padel- 
ford had in fact never read the book. Of 
course ij: fell to me to make as good a fight 
for him against many of the old friends of 
the Journal as I could. The strong bank 
account of the Spragues was heavily drawn 
upon, and Mr. Padelford who spent his 
money freely was defeated. 

During the campaign two or three gen- 
tlemen, who were managing the Sprague 
campaign, waited on me and asked if the 
Journal could be bought. (They had no 
newspaper then.) I repHed that I did not 
ow^n it, but that I presumed that like other 
property it could be bought if enough was 
offered for it. They talked on for some 
time rather vaguely, until at last it appeared 
that they did not care to buy it unless I was 
bought with it. When I discovered this I 
rephed, holding up my quill pen, "As I have 
said, I presume you can buy the Journal, 
but the Spragues have not money enough 
to buy this quill." Whereupon they with- 
drew. 

Another interesting incident occurred in 
the campaign. We invited Abraham Lin- 
coln to make a speech in Providence. He 
had come to New York to give his Address, 

[116] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

now SO famous, which shows that the 
Fathers of the Repubhc hved in the hope of 
the ultimate extinction of slavery. He was 
an entire stranger in Providence; and 
when he appeared on the stage with his 
long, lank figure, his loose frock coat, his 
hair just cut rather close, his homely face, 
we were rather disappointed. But as he 
proceeded with his speech our soHcitude 
disappeared. It so happened that I sat by 
the side of the editor of the Democratic 
paper, Welcome B. Sayles.^ At the close 
of the address he said to me, ''That is the 
finest constitutional argument for a popu- 
lar audience that I ever heard." And cer- 
tainly I agreed with him. 

It was not long before the speaker 
was nominated for the Presidency. Rhode 
Island like other Eastern states had hoped 
for the nomination of Seward. x\nd when 
the news of Lincoln's nomination came, 
we recalled that awkward figure which 
we had seen in Railroad Hall, and heard 
the commendations of him as a rail-split- 
ter, and we wondered whether he was 
to prove the leader we needed for the 
trying days we were expecting. So keen 
was the disappointment in the State that 

1 Mr. Sayles afterwards went to the war as Colonel of 
the Seventh Rhode Island regiment, and was killed. 

[117] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

clearly an effort was needed to secure him 
earnest support. 

I bethought myself of one source of help. 
I remembered that John Hay, my old pupil, 
was a student of law in Lincoln's office. I 
wrote to him, explaining the situation and 
asking him to write a few letters about Lin- 
coln, which would help me in awakening 
enthusiasm. He complied with m^y request, 
but he was so accustomed to look at Lincoln 
with western eyes that he dwelt unduly for 
my purpose on the qualities which had made 
him so popular in Illinois. I "edited" his 
writing severely and published it. What 
would I not give now for the original manu- 
script which went to the waste basket with 
other copy! 

During the war the labour of editing was 
very severe but intensely interesting. The 
breach in the Republican party was healed, 
and finally Mr. Padelford was elected Gov- 
ernor, largely by the aid of the supporters 
of Sprague. I found the annoyance of edi- 
torial life much less than I had anticipated. 
The oflSce was the gathering place for all the 
prominent men in the state. My practice 
was to write in the outer room surrounded 
by these men. I was thus able to feel the 
public pulse every day and to get many 
excellent suggestions from the conversation. 

[118] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

I used jocosely to say to some of these 
bright men that "I milked every cow that 
came into my enclosure." 

I recall with interest visits to the office 
of many prominent men, among them 
Charles Sumner, Schuyler Colfax, Henry J. 
Raymond, Editor of the New York Times, 
Horace Greeley, and Governor Andrew. 
Of all these the most stimulating to the 
young editor was Governor Andrew, with 
his lofty enthusiasms and great good sense. 
Mr. Greeley having once asked for a place 
where he could write, I offered him my 
table, which was of the usual height. "You 
don't write at such a table as that, do you?" 
said he. "Let me have some books to pile 
on it." I piled up on it the bound volumes 
of the Congressional Record, until when he 
was seated they reached to his chin, and on 
top he spread his paper and wrote. 

After George W. Danielson in 1863 be- 
came connected with the Journal, the super- 
vision of the business, of the printing, of the 
local reporting, and of the evening edition, 
called the Bulletin, was assumed by him. 
Perhaps I may properly say now that he 
and I conceived the idea of purchasing, if 
practicable, the Journal and publishing it as 
a non-partisan independent newspaper. But 
Senator Anthony was unwilling to sell. 

[119] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

In 1866 the severity of the work in which 
I had really been engaged for eight years, 
with only a week's vacation in each year, 
was beginning to affect my health. An 
urgent call to return to academic life led 
me to accept the presidency of the Univer- 
sity of Vermont in August of that year. 
But my experience of newspaper life has 
been of great service to me in all my sub- 
sequent career. Editorial work trains one 
to both readiness and accuracy in writing. 
One learns to say on the first trial exactly 
what one means to say, and to avoid dif- 
fuseness. One who has a responsible charge 
in the conduct of a newspaper has large 
opportunities to understand men and to 
test his own courage in standing for what is 
right and conducive to the public good, 
especially when in his opinions he differs 
from some of his friends. It was not with- 
out much reluctance that I decided to 
abandon editorial life and return to aca- 
demic work. 



[120] 



THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNIVER- 
SITY OF VERMONT 

The University of Vermont, founded in 
1791, though a small college, had an hon- 
ourable history. Its standard of work 
compared favourably always with the better 
New England colleges. Eminent scholars 
had held places in its Faculty. President 
James Marsh, one of the first Americans to 
commend Coleridge to us, was one of the 
most gifted philosophers this country has 
produced. President Wheeler, Professor 
Joseph Torrey, the translator of Neander, 
Professor Shedd, afterward a member of the 
Faculty of the Union Theological Semi- 
nary in New York, and Professor George 
W. Benedict, a most energetic adminis- 
trator, had given to the college a reputation 
which attracted students from beyond the 
boundaries of the State. It had a good 
proportion of eminent graduates. 

The Civil War, however, had broken its 
strength. A large number of its students 
entered the army, and the boys in the 
academies were diverted from college to the 

[m] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

public service. The resources of the insti- 
tution dechned. Its friends became de- 
spondent. Some thought it must die. 

But when the so-called Morrill Bill, estab- 
lishing Agricultural Colleges, was passed, 
the trustees decided to accept the endow- 
ment offered to Vermont and to organize 
the college in connection with the Univer- 
sity. Senator Morrill became one of the 
trustees. Some of the old classical gradu- 
ates feared the result. 

My task was to organize the Agricultural 
College and effect a harmonious union with 
the old college, to aid in raising funds which 
it was clearly seen were needed, and to in- 
spire the pubhc and especially the alumni 
with the confident belief that the Institu- 
tion really had a future. 

This required all the energy and enthu- 
siasm which I could command. In some 
measure the college had drifted away from 
the people in Burlington, owing to their de- 
spondency about it. One of the first steps 
my wife and I took was to bring the citizens 
into close social relations with the college. 
The addition of cultivated young men to 
the Faculty made this easy. I then im- 
proved every opportunity to visit schools, 
to lecture in many towns, to address the 
county and state fairs on agricultural edu- 

[122] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

cation, in fact to beat the bushes from 
one end of the state to the other in 
order to convince the pubhc that we were 
ahve and were especially desirous to do 
something for the farmers. I need hardly 
add they were the hardest class to con- 
vince that we could be of any help to 
them. With an associate from the Trustees 
or from the Faculty, I visited Boston, New 
York, and Washington, to obtain subscrip- 
tions. I remember with pleasure as soon as 
we reached Washington, Henry J. Raymond, 
who was an alumnus, gathered five other 
alumni in Congress in front of the Speaker's 
desk, before the session opened, and after 
making a handsome subscription himself, 
induced them all to subscribe. Thaddeus 
Stevens was one of them. 

As we had not funds enough to com- 
plete our Faculty, I set myself to teach the 
branches not provided for, namely, Rhetoric, 
History, German, and International Law. 

The persons who w^ere of the most assist- 
ance to me in this work of raising money 
and awakening the state were Grenville G. 
Benedict, Secretary of the Corporation, and 
Professor Buckham, w^ho filled the place of 
President after I left, until his death in 1910. 

In all that strenuous life there were some 
amusing experiences. I was speaking one 

[123] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

day at the State Fair at Brattleboro. As I 
sat down, a gentleman planted himself 
squarely before me and exclaimed, ''Sir, 
how old are you?" I was a little surprised 
at being accosted thus by a stranger. Sud- 
denly it occurred to me that the State Luna- 
tic Asylum was in that town, and I said to 
myself, "This is some harmless patient to 
whom they have allowed liberty." So I 
said to him, "Sir, how old are you.^" He 
replied, "I am thirty -eight." I then said, 
"That is exactly my age." He went away 
satisfied. I learned on inquiry that he was 
pastor of a church in the town. 

Afterwards in Vermont, I was repeatedly 
asked when introduced to a stranger, how 
old I was. I know of no explanation, out 
of China, for such a usage, except that some 
of the recent Presidents had been advanced 
in years and infirm, and there was genuine 
surprise at seeing one so young as I was. 

I also once learned how much it w^as worth 
to attend the funeral of a relative who was 
a benefactor of the college. A man who 
had given his little property to endow some 
scholarships on condition the college should 
pay his board with a nephew and niece so 
long as he lived, finally died. I attended 
the funeral. The nephew and niece accom- 
panied the body some miles with me to the 

[ 124 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

burial. I told them to send me the bill for 
the funeral expenses. When it came it 
contained a per diem charge for the time 
consumed in going to the burial. I ordered 
the treasurer to pay that bill, since it was 
worth the price to learn what one can earn 
in attending a relative's funeral. 

When I went to Burhngton, I found in 
force a rule that any student who in his 
whole college course should have ten un- 
excused absences must be expelled. I said 
at once, "That is a foohsh rule. What will 
happen is that you will excuse the tenth 
absence. However, until we change the 
rule, I w^ill enforce it." 

A rather slack, self-indulgent boy came 
to me to be excused to attend his grand- 
mother's funeral. He had nine unexcused 
absences. But of course I excused him. 
In two weeks he came to be excused to at- 
tend another grandmother's funeral. As 
he might have two grandmothers, I ex- 
cused him again. Judge of my surprise 
when in two weeks more he came to be ex- 
cused to attend another grandmother's 
funeral. *'How is this," I said, *'You 
have been to two grandmother's funerals." 
*'Yes." he replied, ''This is my step-father's 
mother." "I see," said I, "but mark my 
word, if you have another grandmother's 

[no] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

funeral, you will leave college." He gradu- 
ated. 

The administration of a college with a 
small number of students taught me cer- 
tain lessons. It gave me peculiar pleasure 
from my intimate personal acquaintance 
with each pupil and in many cases with his 
parents. Since I also taught every one in 
more than one branch, I was able to guide 
and impress them all, to direct their reading 
and writing and help shape their character 
and their plans as would have been quite 
impossible in a large institution. The rela- 
tions thus established between me and them 
have been a source of permanent gratifica- 
tion to me and I trust to not a few of them. 

Nor can I refrain from recalling the friend- 
ship formed with two eminent citizens of 
Burlington, which proved of lasting pleas- 
ure and service to me. I refer to Senator 
Edmunds and the Honourable E. J. Phelps, 
afterwards Minister to Great Britain. They 
were the leading lawyers of Vermont. Sen- 
ator Edmunds showed in his long public 
service the powers of a great statesman, and 
to the great regret of the nation withdrew 
too early from official life. Mr. Phelps 
was one of the most brilliant minds whom 
it has been my fortune to know. Un- 
happily during most of his life he was on 

[126] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

the wrong side in polities to be called into 
public service. They both lent a charm to 
social life in Burhngton, which makes me 
look back on it as a good fortune to have 
dwelt there w^ith them. 

Though I lived in Vermont only five 
years, I formed a wide acquaintance in the 
State, and became strongly attached to the 
people. They were an agricultural com- 
munity of the best type. Serious, earnest, 
industrious, frugal, they formed their opin- 
ions with deliberation, and adhered to them 
firmly. Their moral and rehgious ideals 
were high. The sons of Vermont, scattered 
far and wide through the land, reflect great 
honour upon her. 

The university has received generous 
gifts from its alumni and other friends and 
has enjoyed great prosperity under Presi- 
dent Buckham.^ 

1 He died November 29, 1910, after thirty-nine years 
of service as President. He has been succeeded by Dr. 
Guy Potter Benton. 



[127] 



VI 
THE MISSION TO CHINA^ 

On February 20, 1880, I received a letter 
from Hon. H. P. Baldwin, a Senator from 
Michigan, informing me that Mr. Evarts, 
Secretary of State, desired to see me at an 
early date in Washington on a matter of 
public interest. It occurred to me as pos- 
sible that he wished me to take a place on 
a commission to consider either the Fish- 
eries Question or the Isthmian Interoceanic 
Canal Question. 

I soon w^ent to Washington, and with 
Senator Baldwin called on the Secretary 
by appointment at his house. I learned 
from him that my friend Senator Edmunds 
of Vermont had some months before di- 
rected his attention to me as a suitable 
person for diplomatic service. 

The Secretary soon made it known to me 
that he desired me to go to China as one of 

1 Though I went from Vermont to the University of 
Michigan in 1870, it seems most convenient to defer the 
narrative of my Hfe in Michigan until after the descrip- 
tion of my experience in pubhc Hfe, and of two journeys 
to Europe, 

[128] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

two Commissioners (the other to be a Cali- 
fornian), to secure, if possible, a revision of 
our treaties with that Empire, especially 
with the purpose of restraining in some 
degree the emigration which was threaten- 
ing to flood the Pacific States. He dwelt 
on the importance of adjusting this Asiatic 
life to ours in some way best both for the 
Chinese and for us. His manner and con- 
versation were most charming. A vein of 
humour ran through his gravest talk like a 
vein of silver through the rock. To my 
inquiry whether he had any reason to sup- 
pose the Chinese were ready to accede to 
his propositions, he replied that General 
Grant had, in his interviews w^ith high 
Chinese officials, received the impression 
that they were ready to take some steps in 
that direction. He added then in his 
inimitable way, ''I should not be surprised 
if the Chinese should be entirely willing. 
They may well say, ' You are asking us to 
abide by our own doctrines. We always 
told you that we did not wish to open so 
intimate intercourse with you western na- 
tions. But you forced us at the cannon's 
mouth. You see we were right.' " Con- 
tinuing, he said, "Perhaps we had better 
not despise a government which for thirty 
centuries has ruled a nation now^ numbering 

[129] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

three hundred millions, while we have only 
jBfty millions, and they 'run us.'" 

At the proper time I took occasion to say 
that I thought the Consular history of 
Rome was rather full of warnings against 
the policy of employing a commission of 
two, and that one of three would be more 
likely to accomplish a result, at any rate, 
to avoid an even decision. Later, Senator 
Edmunds advanced the same opinion, and 
finally a Commission of three was decided on. 

At the close of the interview, the Secre- 
tary took me to the White House to see 
President Hayes. He seemed deeply im- 
pressed with the importance of restraining 
the immigration of the Chinese. I asked 
if the government supposed the country 
east of the Rocky Mountains was ready to 
adopt measures restrictive of Chinese immi- 
gration. In reply I was given to under- 
stand that the action of such a Commission 
as they were trying to appoint would of 
itself have much weight in securing ac- 
quiescence in reasonable measures. 

After conference with Senators Edmunds, 
Anthony, Baldwin, and Ferry, I promised 
the Secretary that I would return home, 
give the subject full consideration, consult 
the Regents of the University, and give him 
answer at an early day. 

[ 130 ] 



JAMES B. AN G E L L 

On March 11, I wrote to the Secretary 
to the following effect: that if direct and 
formal prohibition of Chinese immigration 
was desired I preferred that some one else 
should undertake the work, but that if cor- 
rection of the abuses now connected with 
the immigration was desired, and this cor- 
rection should work as a restraint on the 
immigration, I was willing to undertake the 
task. He promptly rephed that there was 
nothing in my letter incompatible with the 
purposes of the President, and he desired 
to send in my name to the Senate at once. 
April 9, 1 was confirmed as Minister and also 
as Chairman of the Commission for revising 
treaties with China. John F. Swift of Cah- 
fornia and WiUiam H. Trescot of South 
Carohna were appointed Commissioners. 

On April 1, I had interesting interviews 
in Washington with Dr. Peter Parker, 
formerly medical missionary at Canton, and 
with George Bancroft, the historian. Both 
of them w^ere opposed to unlimited immigra- 
tion of the Chinese. Mr. Bancroft said he 
did not want to see the young men in Massa- 
chusetts towns forced to compete with the 
Chinese who had such low^ standards of liv- 
ing. He was also not without fear that the 
South might employ them and virtually 
reinstate a quasi-servitude. 

[131] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

On May 26, in response to a summons 
from Mr. Evarts, I reported in company 
with Mr. Trescot at his office in the expec- 
tation of receiving instructions. We had 
very charming interviews with him on four 
successive days. He discoursed at length 
on the various problems, which our rela- 
tions with China have forced upon us, the 
difference between European and Asiatic 
immigration, the commercial questions in- 
volved in the Lekin tax, the importance of 
having an American policy, not tied to 
England, the expediency of dispersing the 
Chinese in our country, the importance of 
impressing the Chinese government with 
our desire to be fair and even generous to- 
wards them, and the question whether we 
can modify the treaty stipulations con- 
cerning ex-territoriality. All this did not 
result in furnishing us any specific instruc- 
tions as to what we should demand in a 
treaty. But the Secretary informed us that 
definite instructions would overtake us on 
our journey. 

On June 4, prominent citizens of Detroit 
gave a dinner in my honour. The Hon. 
George V. N. Lothrop, the most prominent 
member of the Michigan Bar, afterwards 
our Minister to Russia, presided with his 
characteristic grace. I would gladly have 

[132] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

been excused from this reception, but my 
friends persuaded me that it would be help- 
ful to the University. In my remarks I 
carefully refrained from discussing the ques- 
tions which I was about to act on officially. 

On the next day at 4 p.m., the Faculties 
and the students gave me a hearty recep- 
tion in University Hall. 

On June 6, with my wife and daughter 
and youngest son, I started for San Fran- 
cisco and arrived there on the 11th, and 
remained until the 19th. We received 
many hospitalities. Mr. Trescot had 
reached there before me and Mr. Swift re- 
sided there. Especially profitable w^ere in- 
terviews with the Chinese Consul and with 
Mr. Low, who had long been our minister 
to China. Apparently there was a general 
feeling that the coming of Chinese labourers 
should be limited, but not absolutely for- 
bidden. One representative of the Labour 
Unions asked prohibition of immigration in 
order to protect American mechanics. I 
asked him if he could name one mechanic 
who had been crowded out of employment 
by the Chinese, and he confessed he could 
not. 

On June 19, we sailed on the " Oceanic." 
In the voyage of eighteen days we did not, 
after leaving the California coast, see a 

[133] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

single vessel until we approached the coast 
of Japan. We entered the harbour of 
Yokohama at five o'clock in the morning. 
Before the steamer had stopped, Japanese 
boats, filled with half-naked boatmen, 
swarmed about us to take passengers ashore. 
Hardly had we dropped anchor before 
Lieutenant Wainwright (now Admiral) 
came on board to learn when I w^ould receive 
a call from Admiral Patterson, who was in 
command of the United States squadron in 
the harbour. At half-past nine he and 
Captain Johnson, commanding the gun- 
boat, *'Ashuelot " called. Under orders from 
our government they were waiting to take 
us to China on the *' Richmond " and the 
"Ashuelot." As on our arrival they w^ere 
not quite readj^ to depart, we had the pleas- 
ure of spending ten days in Yokohama and 
Tokio. 

In view of the discussion which has been 
carried on for some years concerning the 
expediency of erecting houses at the expense 
of our government for the residences of our 
ministers and ambassadors, it may not be 
amiss to report a conversation I had with 
Judge Bingham, our minister to Japan at the 
time of my visit. Observing that he w^as 
living in a comfortable though modest 
house, I asked him if he had built it at his 

[134] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

own expense. He said, '*0h, no. As we 
have ex-territoriality here, I was obliged to 
ask for an appropriation for a jail. I asked 
my old friends in Congress for an appro- 
priation so liberal that I was able to build 
my house as an annex to the jail." He then 
took me to the rear of the house and showed 
me a prisoner confined in the room which 
was the jail. 

Judge Bingham prided himself on having 
broken away from blindly following Eng- 
land, as most of the other ministers had. 
He said he had seen Sir Harry Parkes, the 
British minister shake his fist under the 
nose of the minister of Foreign Affairs. He 
added that the forcible withdrawal of a 
German vessel from quarantine was really 
stimulated by the Enghshman. 

On July 19, my family and I embarked on 
the United States gunboat "Ashuelot," Cap- 
tain Johnson, for Shanghai. We stopped at 
Kobe and visited the old capital, Kioto. 
The Italian ship of war, " Vettor Pisani," 
under command of the Duke of Genoa, 
was at Kobe. We exchanged calls with him 
and found him very cordial and simple in 
his manners. He preferred to be addressed 
simply as Captain. The sail through the 
Inland Sea was charming. It reminded one 
of Lake Champlain and Lake George. 

[135] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

We arrived at Shanghai on July 27, and 
were the guests of Consul-General Denny. 
I was told that Rev. Dr. Yates, an American 
missionary of the Southern Baptist Society, 
knew the Chinamen better than any other 
foreigner in the city. I therefore asked 
him for a description of the Chinaman. He 
said he had studied the Chinaman many 
years. At times he flattered himself that 
he had come to understand thoroughly the 
Chinaman's nature to the very bottom. 
But just as he began to inflate himself with 
complacency at his achievement, some new 
depth in the Chinaman's nature yawned 
below him. About the only thing, he said, 
that you can be sure of when you ask him 
for the grounds of his beliefs is that the 
reasons he gives you are not the real ones. 

On August 1, we reached Chefoo. Mr. 
Swift and Mr. Trescot had arrived on the 
"Richmond." It was thought best that I 
should go on in advance to Peking and ar- 
range for our negotiations, while my col- 
leagues and my family remained in Chefoo. 
The Admiral took me on the " Richmond " 
to Taku, as far as a vessel with her draught 
could go. The " Ashuelot " then took me to 
Tientsin, where we arrived on August 3. 

The next day at 4 p.m., accompanied by 
Mr. Holcomb, Secretary of Legation, and 

[136] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

six naval officers, I went to call on the 
Viceroy Li Hung Chang, at his residence. 
He received us very cordially and frequently 
took occasion to express his friendship for 
the United States. He was very anxious 
to know why General Grant had not been 
nominated again in June. I mentioned 
three reasons, one of which was that there 
was a strong feeling against a third term. 
This he could not understand, repeatedly 
affirming that a man who had served twice 
was thereby better fitted for the place. 

On the following day Li came w ith a large 
retinue to the '' Ashuelot" to return my call. 
He remained an hour and a half and seemed 
in fine spirits. He talked on several subjects 
and joked freely. He repeated a remark 
which I had made to him on the previous 
day that the Brazilians who were trying 
to make a treaty to secure coolies should 
make a draft on us who were trying to 
restrict the immigration. He told me in a 
whisper that although the complications 
with Russia on the Kuldja question were 
serious, he believed China would escape 
war. He said the idiots at Peking had 
dreadfully blundered, that Tso (the Chinese 
general in Kuldja) was a braggart, and that 
he was now under strict orders not to pro- 
voke w^ar with the Russians. 

[137] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Much to my gratification, Li had brought 
General Gordon with him. The General 
had come to China to persuade the govern- 
ment to keep out of a war with Russia. 
He was living by himself in a Buddhist 
temple, and I was told that he remained at 
his devotions until ten o'clock, so that be- 
fore that hour he refused all callers. Hav- 
ing heard of his military achievements, I 
had fancied him to be a big English "sw^ash- 
buckler." Judge of my surprise when a 
man of small stature, with a low and sweet 
voice, with a manner almost feminine in 
delicacy, quietly seated himself close to me 
and told me his story. He said he had come 
to persuade China to refrain from war, from 
wasting her money on ironclads, the or- 
ganization of a great army on the European 
plan, and from a foreign debt. He said 
that the true defence for them is howitzers, 
fleet ships and a sort of guerilla warfare. 
Their soldiers need no tents, and no com- 
missary department. The way for them to 
fight the Russians is to attack them at night, 
allowing them no sleep, and then hasten 
away till the next night. They can thus 
keep them on the run and tire them out. 
He tells them their capital is too near 
Siberia and too near the sea. It can always 
be easily captured. He was there with the 

[138] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

British forces in 1858-60, and knows the 
region thoroughly. He besought me to 
impress these ideas of peace on Li, as I had 
opportunity. He had come to meet me 
for the purpose of making this request. 

The British government soon recalled him, 
because, it was reported, they were afraid 
Russia would take offense at his action. 

Li invited me to dine with him on my 
return from Peking and placed at my dis- 
posal his steam launch to take me twenty- 
five miles up the river. 

I availed myself of his offer, and after 
leaving the launch w^ent by houseboats, 
drawn by men to Tungcho and thence by 
canal to Peking. Mr. Seward, the minister, 
received me at the Legation, and in due 
time introduced me to the Tsung-li-Yamen, 
and presented his recall. Prince Kung im- 
pressed me as far superior to the other mem- 
bers of the Foreign Office. They returned 
my call, and as they were passing through 
the drawing room, some one struck the keys 
of the piano. They hastened with a child- 
like curiosity to look in under the cover of 
the instrument to ascertain w^hat caused 
the sound. Prince Kung announced the 
appointment of two commissioners to ne- 
gotiate with us and assured me they would 
proceed with despatch. 

[139] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

The European ministers generally were 
in expectation of war with Russia. Under 
the walls of the city the soldiers were pre- 
paring by practice to meet the Russian 
army. This practice consisted of firing at 
a target with bows and arrows. 

The Tsung-li-Yamen having learned that 
the Brazilian ministers were approaching 
to make a treaty, asked the American 
Secretary where Brazil was, and if it was a 
country of much consequence. 

Having in two weeks completed my busi- 
ness in Peking, I returned to Chefoo. My 
colleagues and I and our families at once 
set out for Tientsin in the gunboats " Mo- 
nocacy " -and " Ashuelot." We exchanged 
calls with Li and hurried on to Peking. 

On the journey up the river I had an in- 
teresting conversation with Mr. Trescot, 
concerning an event in the Civil War. After 
this lapse of time, I think I may be allowed 
to report it. In the American Case for the 
Geneva Arbitration of the so-called Ala- 
bama Claims, I had read that the British 
government, through Lord Lyons, the Brit- 
ish Minister at Washington, invited our 
government to sign the Declaration of 
Paris (of 1856), and informed the Con- 
federate government of this action. At 
the same time they invited the Confederate 

[ 140 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

government to sign the second and third 
Articles and to omit the first, which forbids 
privateering, but did not inform our gov- 
ernment of this action. Moreover, they 
sent the message to Richmond and Charles- 
ton, through Lord Lyons. If this plan had 
succeeded the South could have commis- 
sioned privateers, while we should have 
been precluded, and the carrying trade for 
both belhgerents would have been secured to 
Great Britain. This was so dishonourable 
a trick, that I had always been reluctant 
to beheve it. As Mr. Trescot was em- 
ployed in our State Department at the time, 
and was also very familiar with transactions 
in the South, I ventured to express my 
doubts of the accuracy of the statement in 
the American Case. He rephed, "You may 
well beheve it, for I myself took the despatch 
from Lord Lyons to Richmond." 

At the first meeting of the Commissioners 
with the Tsung-h-Yamen, we were informed 
that two Commissioners had been appointed 
to negotiate with us, Pao Chun, an aged 
member of the body with an excellent repu- 
tation for honesty, and Li Hung Tsao, one 
of the most noted historical scholars. 

It will be understood that I held two 
Commissions, one as Minister Plenipoten- 
tiary and one as Commissioner to negotiate 

[141] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

treaties. Therefore I had in hand the regu- 
lar business of the Legation as well as work 
on the Treaties. 

When we American Commissioners met 
to draft a paper to present to the Chinese 
Commissioner, there was a sharp difference 
of opinion between Mr. Swift on the one 
side and Mr. Trescot and myself on the 
other. Mr. Swift wished that we should 
demand the absolute prohibition of the 
immigration of labourers. Mr. Trescot and 
I maintained that we should ask merely for 
a stipulation giving us power to regulate, 
but not to forbid, absolutely, immigration. 
Mr. Swift asked that we telegraph to Mr. 
Evarts for authority to present his demand. 
We declined to do so. Mr. Swift of course 
yielded, but not without some feeling. We 
allowed him to spread on the record his 
propositions and his protest against ours. 

When we read our statement to the 
Chinese, Pao said there were some diffi- 
culties on both sides, but he thought there 
were none which might not be adjusted. 

After two or three meetings the details 
of which I will not give, we found one day 
to our surprise the whole Yamen in attend- 
ance. They had brought a full pro jet for a 
treaty, containing provisions that any re- 
striction in immigration should apply to 

[142] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

California alone, that artisans should not 
be excluded, that there should be no punish- 
ment for labourers coming in violation of the 
treaty, and allowing persons, not Americans, 
to import and employ Chinese labourers. 
We did not encourage them to suppose we 
could accept their draft, but took it away 
for consideration. 

Two days later we had a most anxious, 
and, as it proved, a decisive session with the 
Chinese. We took up the first Article in 
their draft and the first in ours, regulating 
immigration, and found ourselves so at vari- 
ance with them, that Mr. Swift declared 
they did not mean to give us a treaty, and 
Mr. Trescot, usually hopeful, thought we 
had come to the end, and that we had better 
state our ultimatum and go. But I saw 
the Chinese earnestly discussing and I sug- 
gested patience, saying that w^e might well 
spend an hour there, that perhaps never 
would our time be more valuable. Let us 
leave this Article, I advised, and take up the 
last. Let the fish chew the bait awhile. 
The last Article was one which provided 
that no laws we should pass in respect to 
immigration should be operative until ap- 
proved by them. This was so unreason- 
able that they soon said they would waive 
that. Then we took up the Article in 

[143] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

which they seemed to us to ask that Chinese 
students and merchants could take with 
them employees. They explained that they 
meant by that only household servants. 
To that we had no objection. Having now 
got into the mood of agreeing, we went 
back to Article I. I pointed out to them 
that this clause asking that no limitation 
should be excessively great or excessively 
long was inappropriate to a treaty, and 
would only cause discussion instead of 
hindering it. They consented to change 
that. As to their clause about penalties 
they said they only wished to guard against 
personal abuse and maltreatment. We 
agreed to guard against this. We thus paved 
the way for dove-tailing their first Article 
and oiu-s together, and the work was done. 
It was agreed that Mr. Holcombe, the 
Secretary, should come the next day and 
with them arrange the texts. 

Greatly relieved, we were about to leave, 
when Pao detained us. He said he wished 
to speak of one thing more. When the 
Chinese treaties with the Western Powers 
were made, they were one-sided. Now as 
they wished to push new trade abroad, they 
desired to secure equal commercial privi- 
leges. As the United States had always 
been their friend, they preferred to begin 

[144] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

with US, and they wished to know if we 
could consider a proposition for a treaty or 
an article in this treaty on that point. We 
cordially responded that we would take the 
matter into friendly and sympathetic con- 
sideration. 

Apparently the Chinese intended to give 
us the treaty we had made, but to concede 
us as little as possible. We completed the 
final agreement on the Immigration Treaty 
at 3 P.M., November 8. 

We then left with them our draft of a 
Commercial Treaty. In it the two nations 
agree to favour the extension of commerce 
with each other, to fix the rate of tonnage 
dues and import duties on the same scale for 
both nations, to prohibit the trade in opium 
between them, and to provide for the trial 
of a person in the court of his nationality. 
We had reason to believe that the dues and 
duties for Chinese vessels entering Chinese 
ports were less than for our vessels. The 
request for the opium Article originated 
with Li Hung Chang. We were very will- 
ing to adopt it, though Mr. Trescot had 
fears that we might be criticized for it as w^e 
had no instructions on the subject. But I 
believed that it would meet with favour at 
home, though it might be criticized in 
England. 

11 [ 145 ] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

After the agreement on the treaties, the 
Chinese Commissioners sent presents to us, 
consisting of ham, sausages, fruits, chest- 
nuts, and cakes for which the messengers, 
bringing them, expected and received suit- 
able fees. 

There was an interesting incident con- 
nected with the signing of the treaties. We 
had fixed on a day for signing them. When 
we arrived at the Yamen, the Commission- 
ers with an air of great mortification an- 
nounced that they could not sign on that 
day, that it was the Emperor's birthday, 
on which they could sign no document 
containing a word of unhappy significance, 
that such a word occurred in the treaties, 
and that in making the appointment they 
had not remembered that it was the Em- 
peror's birthday, and they therefore asked 
for another date for the signing. Of course 
we assented, and on November 17 we all 
signed. 

The European ministers were astonished 
when we informed them that after forty- 
eight days of negotiations, we had secured 
two treaties. On my arrival at Peking, 
Mr. Von Brandt, the German Minister, 
perhaps the ablest foreign representative 
there, told me that after two years of labour 
he had just procured a treaty and that I 

[146] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

must not hope to finish a negotiation under 
a year. I have always supposed that what- 
ever influence Sir Robert Hart had with 
the Chinese authorities was used to our 
advantage. I saw no evidence that any 
of the foreign powers made any effort to 
hinder us, though reports to the effect that 
some of them did were more or less current. 
My personal relations with all the Ministers 
were most cordial. 

One of the most serious embarrassments 
of the Commission was due to what must 
be considered an error of the State Depart- 
ment in appointing my colleagues Commis- 
sioners Plenipotentiary, instead of Envoys 
or Ministers Extraordinary. The former 
title was unknown to our naval oflScers and 
to European diplomats. So there was 
trouble with the naval officers in respect to 
salutes and it required great care to avoid 
unpleasant comphcations in the social rela- 
tions at Peking. 

After the departure of my colleagues on 
the Commission in the early winter, my 
duties were those of the Minister. A few 
incidents may be worthy of mention, es- 
pecially as illustrating the good dispo- 
sition of the Tsung-li-Yamen. 

As each village holds certain religious 
festivals annually, under Chinese usage, 

[147] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

every village was taxed to meet the ex- 
penses of the festivals. The Christian 
converts were embarrassed by this re- 
quirement, as some of the features of the 
ceremonies were incompatible with the 
Christian faith. The Roman Cathohcs 
had some years before my coming procured 
the exemption of their converts from assess- 
ments for the festivals. When I learned 
this, I asked for the exemption of the Protes- 
tant Christians. The request was received 
with great courtesy, and soon an Imperial 
Decree was issued, relieving the Protestant 
natives from the assessment. 

At an auction sale of the goods of a Pres- 
byterian missionary who was about to 
leave Peking for America on a visit, some 
rude fellows in the crowd which an auction 
always attracts there, threw missiles into 
the grounds, broke down shrubbery, and 
caused much disturbance. When the news 
reached me that the disturbance was going 
on and threatening to become more seri- 
ous, I sent a message to the Yamen, asking 
for protection to the mission. They at once 
sent a detachment of soldiers and arrested 
the mischief makers, and when I went to 
the mission on the next morning, I saw two 
or three of the men arrested, sitting in the 
street by the gateway of the mission, with 

[148] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

cangues on their necks. The authorities 
offered to furnish an armed escort for the 
missionary on his journey out of the city, 
but I dechned this as unnecessary. The 
local olSicial who should have prevented 
the disorder was at once discharged, and 
he appealed to me to interpose for his re- 
appointment. Our local authorities have 
not always been so efficient in protecting 
Chinamen in our cities. 

When Mr. Blaine was Secretary of State, 
a rumour reached him that the Chinese 
government was cherishing a plan to seize 
the Hawaiian Islands. He sent me a very 
spirited despatch, instructing me to call the 
attention of the Yamen to this report and 
warn them that our government would not 
permit such an act. No one in Peking 
attached any importance to the rumour. I 
presented Mr. Blaine's statement with all 
seriousness. It was difficult to make Chi- 
nese ministers comprehend the gist of my 
inquiry about their intention to acquire the 
Islands. But when they did, they burst 
into a roar of laughter, and begged me to 
inform the Secretary that whenever they 
formed such a plan they would give the 
United States timely notice. 

The Japanese Minister, Mr. Shishido, 
who had more than once confided to me his 

[149] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

troubles in doing business with the Chinese 
government, one day came to me, appar- 
ently much depressed in spirits, and said 
that he wished in confidence to lodge a 
document with me. The Yamen, he said, 
had made a treaty with him, and when the 
day on which they had agreed to sign it 
arrived, they refused to sign. He had, 
therefore, in indignation decided to leave 
for home. He had drawn a paper reciting 
the facts, which he was not showing to the 
other foreign ministers. But his nation 
felt so grateful to the United States for its 
kindness and especially to General Grant 
for his wise counsels to them on his recent 
visit, that he wished to leave this docu- 
ment in our hands. 

I received it with hearty appreciation of 
the friendship evinced for us, and especially 
for the gratitude expressed for General 
Grant. I had learned so much in Japan 
and China of the great service Grant had 
tendered to both nations, that this tribute 
to him touched me with pride. He had 
warned them to keep out of war, especially 
with each other. He had showed them how 
war would put them in bondage to European 
creditors and how they should unite to 
effect a permanent co-operation in taking 
their places among the great self-reliant 

[150] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

powers of the world. I had come to feel 
that his services to those tw^o nations were 
second in value only to his services to his 
own nation. They both expressed to him 
their desire that he would act as arbiter in 
settling their trouble about the ownership 
of the Loo Choo Islands. He declined, tell- 
ing them, as he often did, that he was now 
only a private citizen, and could take no 
office. That fact they all came to under- 
stand. 

Naturally I hastened to describe the ac- 
tion of the Japanese Minister to the State 
Department, calling special attention to 
what he said of General Grant. To my 
great surprise, in due time I received a 
reply from the Secretary of State calling 
my attention in very serious tone to the 
fact that General Grant held no official 
post when he w^as in the East, and that I 
should not have neglected my opportunity 
to make that known. Why the honour 
paid to General Grant should have gratified 
the Secretary so little, I leave to the reader 
to conjecture. 

I was interested in finding that some of 
the members of the Tsung-li-Yamen were 
as keen reasoners in a discussion as one will 
meet anywhere. Their intellectual train- 
ing had been purely linguistic. The ques- 

[151] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

tion often suggested itself to me, whether 
this fact had any bearing on the discussions 
we so often have as to the value of our old 
classical training in preparing men for pub- 
lic life. These keen reasoners were almost 
absolutely devoid of mathematical or sci- 
entific education. I sometimes doubted 
whether in reaching their conclusions they 
were aware as we are of taking certain 
logical steps. If they were, they did not 
make known the steps to us, but at once 
stated their conclusions. There was only 
one man in the Tsung-li-Yamen who in 
discussion with me gave his grounds, one, 
two, three, for his opinion as we do. Much 
to my delight he and I worked so harmoni- 
ously that they left him to do most of the 
business with me. His mind seemed to me 
to work like the mind of a AYestern man — 
by logical processes. 

One of the most interesting members of 
the Tsung-li-Yamen was the General Tso 
Tsung Tang, of whom Li Hung Chang had 
spoken to me as a boaster. Perhaps he was, 
but he was entertaining. He talked at my 
table of his campaigns in Kuldja with the 
dramatic air of a Frenchman. It was re- 
ported that he was appointed to the Foreign 
Office in accordance with a shrewd Chinese 
custom of curing a critic by giving him re- 

[152] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

sponsibility. It was related that when he 
came back from his campaign to Peking, he 
complained to the authorities that too great 
privileges were extended to the foreign lega- 
tions, particularly that the French legation 
were allowed by the Yamen to enclose too 
large a part of the street in their yard. He 
was at once appointed as a member of the 
Board. It soon appeared that he enjoyed 
the society of us foreigners, who hstened 
w^ith interest to his conversation, and that 
no one cherished a more hberal spirit to us 
than he did. 

^Mien the Russian Czar was assassinated, 
he inquired who killed him. AMien told 
that it was the deed of Nihilists, he asked 
who they were. When informed that they 
were a secret society, pledged to kill sov- 
ereigns, he said, "Secret societies! they 
ought to make short work with them. 
A few^ years ago the province of Fuhkien 
was honeycombed with secret societies, and 
in their conflicts with each other they were 
destroying villages. The government sent 
me down there to restore peace. In about 
six weeks I had perfect tranquillity." 

*'Well, your Excellency," he was asked, 
"how did you accomplish that?" "AMiy, 
in two weeks I cut oft' the heads of about 
three thousand men, and it was perfectly 

[153] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

quiet after that." And he spoke of it as 
calmly as though he were talking of killing 
so many flies. 

A business meeting with the Yamen was 
always, in theory, a social meeting. Refresh- 
ments were invariably served, and it was 
vain to attempt to engage their attention to 
a matter of business until the refreshments 
were disposed of. It would seem that this 
usage was calculated to bring men to their 
conference in an amicable frame. 

Sir Thomas Wade, the British Minister, 
was a most genial gentleman, with a large 
fund of Irish wit. As his family were in 
England during our residence in Peking, he 
was kind enough to be much in our house 
and contributed immensely to our pleasure. 
He had a great fund of stories. One he 
told on D 'Israeli and Gladstone is perhaps 
worth repeating. DTsraeli once said to a 
friend in conversation that the English 
artists lacked imagination. Within an hour 
he had occasion to address a society of Eng- 
hsh painters and declared that they excelled 
in imaginative powers. Gladstone being 
told of this said he could see how in the 
fervour of debate one might say such a 
thing, but how one could do it in such 
circumstances he could not see. "It is 
hellish," he exclaimed. 

[154] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

Sir Thomas was a superior Chinese 
scholar. He wrote the text book which 
most students used in learning the language, 
and was fond of talking about the language. 
He said there is great difficulty in reducing 
the grammar to our categories. The Chi- 
nese do not seek classification of parts of 
speech but are content to follow precedent 
and usage. Exactness is attainable in the 
expression of thought in it, though its 
machinery for mode and tense is clumsy. 
It has changed but little in five thousand 
years. 

It is sometimes remarked in diplomatic 
circles that a minister may become in a 
measure disqualified for his duties by too 
long service at one post. He comes to look 
at questions from the point of view of the 
people with whom he has long dwelt. It 
was charged that Sir Thomas often in- 
stinctively took the Chinaman's view of a 
controversy between England and China, 
and so failed to satisfy the British Foreign 
Office. 

I have heard that once when President 
Grant was asked to appoint as our minis- 
ter at Peking a gentleman who had spent 
most of his life in China, he replied that he 
had but one objection, namely, that he did 
not wish to appoint a Chinaman. 

[155] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

My intimate acquaintance with Sir Rob- 
ert Hart, the head of the Imperial Customs, 
was of great help to me and the source of 
great pleasure. He, like Sir Thomas, was 
of Irish birth. He was a graduate of the 
University of Belfast, and a fine classical 
scholar. He kept up his reading of Greek 
and Latin in the midst of all his official 
cares. He was, of course, a great Chinese 
scholar. His advice to the government was 
supposed to be of great weight, as it de- 
served to be. 

He told me, however, that one of his 
chief obstacles was the conservatism and 
stupidity of some of the mandarins with 
whom he had to do. For his diversion he 
played on the violin. He said that some of 
the mandarins declared that he was paid a 
large salary for sitting all day on his divan 
and fiddling. 

The government had founded a college 
for the training of young Chinese to enter 
into the diplomatic service. The American 
missionary, Rev. Dr. Martin, was the 
President. During his temporary absence, 
Mr. Hart was put in charge. He asked me 
to visit the college from time to time and 
report to him what I found. The Profes- 
sors were Europeans, who were teaching 
English, French, and Russian and branches 

[ 156 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

of Western learning. They told me that 
the students were so afraid of being sup- 
posed to have any connection with for- 
eigners, that they would not recognize them 
on the streets. The students were granted 
an allowance like our students at Annapolis 
and West Point. Mr. Hart wittily de- 
scribed them as the sons of mandarins who 
allowed their offspring for a consideration to 
be defiled with the pitch of Western learning. 

Mr. Hart told me that he came near 
joining the Tai-pings in their great rebel- 
lion in 1859, and that he believed they would 
have succeeded if the foreigners had not 
joined the government in opposing them 
and that they w^ould probably have given as 
good a government as that which prevailed. 

He placed great stress on the filial respect 
and reverence of the Chinese, saying Provi- 
dence had fulfilled the divine promise of 
length of days to the nation which obeyed 
the command to honour the fathers. 

He talked frankly to me of some of their 
serious faults and of their antipathy to 
foreigners, and as if foreseeing what actually 
befell his ow^n house in the Boxer troubles, 
said "None of us know how soon in some 
excitement our houses may all be in flames." 

The most brilliant minister at Peking 
w^as Von Brandt, the German. He was the 

[157] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

son of General Von Brandt, distinguished 
in the war of German Independence against 
Napoleon. He had served several years in 
Japan, and understood the Oriental mind 
thoroughly, and had the means of getting 
access to the secrets of the Chinese govern- 
ment. As the legations acted together on 
matters of common interest, he was of great 
service to us. His diplomatic career was 
terminated in a very romantic manner. He 
chose to marry a very accomplished Ameri- 
can lady. At that time, it was not per- 
mitted to German diplomats to marry 
ladies not of their own nationality. 

Two young men whose names afterwards 
became widely known were at that time in 
the German legation. One was Count 
Tattenbach, a member of a very old Ba- 
varian family, who won distinction by 
representing his country in the Morocco 
troubles and also by being Governor of 
Alsace-Lorraine. The other was Baron 
Von Ketteler, whose bravery in attempting 
to leave Peking in the Boxer troubles caused 
his murder on the principal street of the 
city, at the spot now marked by an impos- 
ing monument erected by the Chinese 
government. 

Although I had found my diplomatic 
labours attractive in many respects, and 

[158] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

should perhaps have been disposed to con- 
tinue in the service if ministers could have 
counted on a permanent tenure, I decided 
to return to my academic duties and there- 
fore asked the President to accept my resig- 
nation. 

On October 4, we bade adieu to Peking. 
A considerable number of our diplomatic 
and missionary friends gathered at our resi- 
dence to say good-bye, and several rode out 
a few miles with us on our road to Tungcho. 
The life at Peking in our time was so remote 
from the rest of the world that the friend- 
ships formed there were very close. It was 
not without deep emotion that we parted 
from those whose society had been so dear 
to us. 

On arriving at Tientsin, I called on the 
Viceroy, Li Hung Chang. He received me 
most affably, and thanked me very warmly 
for my part in making the Opium Treaty. 
I thought the opportunity favourable for 
telling him some plain truth. I ventured to 
say that I thought that he could carry Eng- 
land for the anti-opium doctrine in five 
years on one condition, namely, that the 
Chinese officials should in at least five 
provinces take hold of the work of suppress- 
ing the growth of the poppy with vigour. 
I assured him that the English maintain 

[159] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

that the Chinese wish to stop the importing 
of opium merely to raise it themselves and 
tax it for revenue. I do not think he en- 
joyed my remarks. He assured me that 
in five provinces (Chi-li being one) the 
growth was already controlled. It was not 
courteous for me to question his statement ; 
but there was abundant evidence that 
much was growing in Chi-li at that 
moment. 

I expressed the regret of my government 
at the recall of the Chinese students from 
America, which had just taken place. He 
appeared also to regret it. 

He courteously expressed the desire that 
I should return to my post. 

I attended the opening of a hospital 
under very interesting circumstances. Miss 
Howard, a medical missionary, who had 
graduated at the University of Michigan, 
had been assigned to duty at Tientsin. She 
was called to render professional services to 
the wife of the Viceroy, and had been the 
means of restoring her to health. To show 
his gratitude the Viceroy made a generous 
contribution to found a hospital and in- 
duced his subordinate officials to contribute 
also. On its completion Miss Howard fixed 
a day for the opening, when I could be pres- 
ent and make an address. The Viceroy and 

[160] 



JAMES B. ANGEL L 

other high Chinese officials and the foreign 
Consuls were present. The Viceroy made 
very kind and complimentary remarks 
about Miss Howard. In my address I of 
course made proper recognition of his gen- 
erous interest in the hospital. It has been 
of great service to sufferers. I w^as told 
that one man had brought his father in his 
arms two hundred miles to be operated on 
there. 

In this connection I may say that in my 
residence in China I was much interested 
in the work of the Christian missionaries, 
both Roman Catholic and Protestant. 

Some of the Jesuit missionaries who 
wielded so great an influence at the court 
of the Emperors in the seventeenth cen- 
tury, were men of large mould as scholars, 
divines, and statesmen. It was with great 
reverence that I stood in the cemetery, just 
outside the walls of Peking, where Ricci, 
Schaal, Verbiest, and others lie buried, and 
thought how near, as it seems to me, they 
came to making China a Roman Catholic 
country. For a time they won the favour 
of Emperors, and led scholars and high 
officials to adopt their faith. Their achieve- 
ments, their lives of self-denial, their suffer- 
ings form a most interesting chapter in the 
history of missionary effort. 

[ 161 ] 

12 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Unhappily the success which seemed com- 
ing to them was checked by dissensions 
which sprang up between them and the 
Dominicans concerning the lawfulness of 
ancestral worship for Christian converts. 
The controversy divided for a time the 
church in Europe and resulted in the con- 
demnation of the Jesuits' position by two 
Popes and in a decree by the Chinese Em- 
peror expelling missionaries from the land. 

All missionaries w^ho have prohibited 
those usages which we call ancestral wor- 
ship have found that prohibition one of the 
gravest obstacles to the acceptance of the 
Christian faith. These early Jesuits, after 
a careful study, concluded that the usages 
were not properly called worship, but were 
only a manifestation of fihal regard for an- 
cestors, which was not at all inconsistent 
with Christian faith. Some of our modern 
Protestant missionaries hold the same 
opinion, though most of them do not. And 
Popes Clement XI and Benedict XIV were 
led to forbid it by Papal Bulls. The con- 
flict on the subject raged in the Roman 
Cathohc Church for three quarters of a 
century. 

The presence of many American Protes- 
tant missionaries in China raised questions 
for my official action from time to time, as 

[162] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

their work was interfered with by lawless 
men. But for the most part our mission- 
aries showed much tact and judgment in 
avoiding difficulties. They called on me 
for help so much more rarely than some of 
the British missionaries called on Sir 
Thomas Wade that he once asked me 
jocosely if I would not trade missionaries 
with him. 

Quite apart from any consideration of 
their religious activity, the influence our 
missionaries have exerted in preparing the 
way for the great change now going on in 
China can hardly be overestimated. A 
considerable number of the young men just 
sent to this country for education have 
received their training in the missionary 
schools. Each missionary station has fur- 
nished an illustration of the western learn- 
ing they are coveting. 

We spent a few days at Shanghai, await- 
ing the sailing of the French steamer Ira- 
wadi, for Europe. Dining one evening 
with Mr. Cameron, the manager of the 
Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, he men- 
tioned two facts worth repeating. He said 
his Bank had loaned many thousand pounds 
to Chinese merchants without taking so 
much as a scrap of paper to show for it, and 
the Bank never lost a sixpence by them. 

[163] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Again, speaking of the testing of the silver 
sycee, in which they had to deal largely, he 
said they had in their service a Chinaman 
who by his mere sense of touch could de- 
termine so exactly the quality of the metal, 
that his finding in respect to it could be as 
absolutely relied on as analysis. It was 
apparently a gift inherited in some families. 

I met at Shanghai an American of whom 
I had often heard, the freight agent of the 
China Merchants' Steamship Company. I 
was told that he had marked success in or- 
ganizing the business, that he was very 
musical and that he was well versed in 
European languages. He was a coloured 
man and came to China with Anson Bur- 
lingame. 

On our passage to Hong Kong the tail of 
a typhoon struck us astern and we were 
obliged to put on full steam to prevent the 
following waves from overrunning us. 
Chinese junks going north were lying with 
large baskets attached to their bows, slowly 
drifting astern. I asked the captain what 
was to happen if, in plunging on at such a 
rate, we came on one of these junks. 
"Ah!" said he, "nous le couperons comme 
un fromage." And I fear he cared as little 
as though the junk had been a cheese. 

The voyage to Europe, thirty-eight days 
[164] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

from Shanghai to Marseilles, was very en- 
joyable. We called at Hong Kong, Saigon, 
Singapore, Point de Galle, Colombo, Aden, 
Suez, Port Said, and Naples. We had 
intended to debark at Naples, but were 
prevented by the fact that at Singapore we 
received some Dutch passengers from Java, 
where the cholera was raging. At Mar- 
seilles we were kept in quarantine twenty- 
four hours. 

We made a tour through Italy, Germany, 
and Paris to London, and sailed from Liver- 
pool on the Cunard steamer *' Catalonia " 
on January 28, for New York. 

I will mention here one incident on the 
journey, and our experience on the voyage. 

Travelling by rail from Marseilles to 
Rome, we reached the little town of Venti- 
miglia in the early evening in the midst of 
what seemed to be a cloudburst. The train 
came to a standstill just before we arrived 
at the station, and remained there until the 
water, coming down from the chff, reached 
the body of the cars. The officials of the 
road asked us to allow ourselves to be 
carried to the station on the backs of men. 
As I saw one fall down with a passenger, I 
declined and said we would pass the night 
in the comfortable carriage we were occupy- 
ing. After a httle the officials returned 

[165] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

saying there was danger that the track and 
the station would be washed away, that the 
train would be pulled up to the station, and 
that we must leave the carriage. Accord- 
ingly we did so. We found the water on the 
station floor ankle deep. We made our 
way to a little inn. On entering we saw a 
horse hitched to the post of the front stair- 
way. The barn had been undermined by 
the storm and the horse had been rescued. 
The innkeeper built a fire at which we dried 
our clothes and then went to bed. 

The next mornmg I was told that the 
railway could not be repaired for some days. 
I decided to hire a coachman to drive me 
down the beautiful Cornice road to Genoa. 
Hardly had we started when the Mayor 
stopped us, saying that a building in front 
of which we had to pass was beginning to 
fall, and that the motion of our carriage 
might tumble it down altogether. I finally 
persuaded him to let us dismount and send 
the carriage past the building very gently, 
while we followed on foot. In this way we 
escaped from Ventimiglia. 

We drove to San Remo to pass the night. 
As I was giving the coachman orders to call 
for us in the morning, I was informed that 
the railway bridge a few miles further on 
had been carried away and could not be 

[166] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

repaired for some days. After remaining 
three days at San Remo, I learned that a 
temporary footbridge had been erected 
near Taggia by the side of the wrecked rail- 
way bridge, and that from Taggia trains 
were running eastward. So we drove to 
the footbridge, had our trunks carried over 
by porters, and finally reached a train. 
So much for railway travelling under the 
shadow of the Italian Alps. 

As the Cunard line of steamers had the 
reputation of being very safe, I took passage 
for my family and myself in the Cata- 
lonia, which had made but one voyage. 
She was very commodious; but it proved 
that her engines were not powerful enough 
to hold her head up against heavy gales. 
Unluckily we encountered three. She was 
obhged to run before the wind in each case, 
and so went far out of her course. The sea 
broke into the dining-hall and flooded it. 
As we approached Newfoundland the cap- 
tain found we were getting short of fuel and 
turned towards St. Johns to procure coal. 
But we ran into so strong drift ice that this 
plan had to be abandoned, and we had to 
take our chance of getting to Halifax. 
Another terrific gale delayed us. We ran 
by the entrance to Hahfax harbour and 
barely escaped getting aground in a small 

[167] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

bay. It was reported that we had to burn 
some of the woodwork of the ship to make 
the harbour. Some of us resolved to take 
the train to Boston. But a three days' 
snow storm had blocked the railway. So 
we remained on the ship and completed our 
voyage to New York in nineteen days from 
Liverpool. The Company sent her back 
without taking passengers. 

We arrived at Ann Arbor on February 24, 
1882, and received a most hearty welcome 
from Faculties and students. 



[168] 



VII 

THE CANADIAN FISHERIES COM- 
MISSION AND THE DEEP WATER- 
WAYS COMMISSION 

In October, 1887, I was invited by Presi- 
dent Cleveland to serve on an International 
Commission to adjust the difficulties which 
had arisen between us and Canada in re- 
spect to the fisheries in the waters near the 
eastern coast of Canada. More or less 
trouble had been experienced almost ever 
since the Treaty of Independence. It had 
often become serious since the negotiation 
of the Treaty of 1818, by which our privi- 
leges were greatly curtailed. Laws, which 
had seriously embarrassed our fishermen, 
had been enacted by Nova Scotia and New 
Brunswick, and later by the Dominion 
Parliament, and they had been adminis- 
tered with unfriendly severity, and, as we 
thought, in violation of the Treaty of 1818. 
The temporary relief furnished by the 
Treaty of 1854, and a part of the Treaty of 
1871, was lost by the abrogation by us of 
the provisions which afforded the relief. 
The friction between our fishermen and the 

[ 169 ] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Canadian authorities had become a menace 
to the continuance of friendly relations be- 
tween us and our neighbour. Congress had 
gone so far as to authorize the President to 
execute retaliatory laws of a severe nature. 
They declined to authorize a commission 
to negotiate on the subject. There was hot 
blood on both sides. 

In the early autumn of 1887, correspond- 
ence with the British government led the 
President to hope that an international 
commission might reach a peaceful and sat- 
isfactory settlement of the controversy by 
amending the Treaty of 1818 or by making 
a new treaty. The two governments agreed 
to submit the problem to such a commis- 
sion. The British government appointed 
Joseph Chamberlain, Sir Charles Tupper, 
the Premier of Canada, and Lord Sackville 
West, the British Minister at Washington, 
as Commissioners. President Cleveland 
appointed Hon. Thomas F. Bayard, the 
Secretary of State, Hon. William L. Put- 
nam, who had been for some time the coun- 
sel of our government in the fishery cases, 
and myself. I was led to accept, partly 
by the urgent request of Hon. E. J. Phelps, 
our Minister to Great Britain, through 
whose hands the correspondence of our 
government with Lord Salisbury had passed. 

[170] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

Lord Playfair told me he himself would 
probably have been appointed on the Com- 
mission if Iddesleigh had lived. 

Some of my friends among the Republi- 
can Senators soon made it clear to me that 
we should take up our work under the 
heavy handicap caused by the fact that the 
President paid no regard to their recorded 
opposition to the appointment of a Com- 
mission. As usual, however, he followed 
his ow^n judgment. 

The Commissioners held their meetings 
at the State Department. Mr. John Bas- 
sett Moore, then Assistant Secretary of 
State, was our Secretary, and Mr. Henry 
Bergne, of the British Foreign Office, was 
the British Secretary. We held meetings 
two or three times a week, from November 
21 to February 15, except for a few days 
at New Year's, when Mr. Chamberlain and 
Sir Charles went to Ottawa to confer with 
the authorities there. I shall not dwell on 
the details of our prolonged discussions. 

From the very outset we were much em- 
barrassed by a misunderstanding on the 
part of the British Commissioners concern- 
ing the scope of the conference. They 
claimed that we were met to consider the 
fisheries only as a part of our commercial 
relations, including in fact the tariff. If 

[171] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

this were not understood to be the case, 
neither Great Britain nor Canada, they 
said, would be represented here. Although 
Mr. Bayard read his correspondence with 
Lord Salisbury in refutation of this assump- 
tion, and showed them that Congress alone 
could change the tariff, more than once, 
when hard pressed in argument on the 
details of our work, they returned to this 
statement, and with much apparent feel- 
ing. Our constant aim was to hold them 
to the consideration of the indisputable 
fact that much of the Canadian legislation 
concerning our fishermen had been of an 
unfriendly and unjustifiable stringency, if 
not in direct violation of the Treaty of 1818, 
and that some change in their policy was 
absolutely essential to the continuance of 
peaceful relations between Canada and us. 
We finally presented a draft of a treaty 
which provided for delimitation of the ex- 
clusion from the common fisheries and for 
a liberal and just interpretation of the con- 
ditions, under which, by the Treaty of 1818, 
the "four purposes" for which fishing 
vessels were to be admitted to Canadian 
ports could be made available to us. It 
secured the free navigation by our vessels 
of the Strait of Canso, the purchase of sup- 
plies on the homeward voyage, and the 

[172] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

liberty to unload and sell cargoes of fish 
from ships in distress. It stipulated that 
if duties on fish should hereafter be removed 
by us, the purchase of bait and fishing 
tackle, the transshipment of cargo and the 
shipping of crews, should be allowed by the 
Canadians. After prolonged discussions, 
in which on several occasions it appeared 
that we were at a deadlock and that no 
agreement could be reached, an agreement 
w^as reached on substantially the above 
provisions on February 14, 1888, and on 
February 15 the treaty w^as signed. 

As the fishing season was soon to begin, 
the British Commissioners offered in behalf 
of Canada a modus Vivendi for two years, by 
which on receiving a license an American 
fishing vessel could have the privileges ac- 
corded by the treaty, even though ratifica- 
tion of it had not been secured. This was 
presented in a separate communication to 
our government after the treaty was signed. 
The Treaty was soon ratified both by the 
Canadian government and by the Queen. 
But in our Senate it w^as opposed by every 
Republican and so failed of ratification. 

The modus has continually been renewed 
by the Canadians: therefore in a sense we 
have been living under the Treaty. And no 
better proof of the worth of the Treaty 

[173] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

could be asked for than is found in the fact 
that not for years previous had there been 
so httle friction on the Canadian coast as 
there has been since 1888.^ 

The fate of the Treaty in the Senate con- 
firms the beHef that it is unwise to submit 
an important treaty for approval to that 
body when a Presidential election is at hand. 
A party in power is reluctant to have its 
opponent get the credit of settling a long and 
bitter controversy on the eve of an election. 

During the winter I met many interest- 
ing men, of some of whom I may say a few 
words. I prize especially the acquaintance 
and friendship I formed with Mr. Bayard. 
A man of singular personal charm, I have 
never known one in public life of higher and 
nobler sense of pubhc duty. He scorned 
the mean arts of the mere politician and 
whatever was unworthy in the spirit and 
policy of his own party. He was so mag- 
nanimous to his opponent, that to a certain 
degree his generosity unfitted him to ne- 

^ Since while the modus Vivendi, which practically put 
the treaty stipulations largely in operation, continued in 
force, we had hardly any difficulties in Canadian waters, 
perhaps the writer may be pardoned for raising the ques- 
tion whether if we had ratified the Treaty, subsequent 
negotiations at least on the issues then under considera- 
tion, would not have been unnecessary. 

[174] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

gotiate with so keen a man as Chamberlain. 
He was tempted to concede too much. He 
was gifted with wit which was never un- 
generous or bitter, but always most enjoy- 
able. Perhaps I may be permitted to give 
an illustration. Lord Sackville West, dur- 
ing our three month's discussions, never said 
anything except to move to adjourn. In 
reply to my inquiry, if in his official relations 
w ith the Secretary he ever volunteered any 
remarks, Mr. Bayard said, "No, he simply 
communicates to me in writing a message 
from Lord Salisbury, and acknowledges in 
writing my reply. That is all." And then 
he added, "I can hardly understand why the 
British government keeps a minister on a 
salary of $25,000, and then reduces him to 
the function of a postage stamp." 

I saw not a little of President Cleveland. 
I was impressed with the readiness with 
which he apprehended all the bearings of 
the discussions which we reported to him, 
and the promptness and soundness of his 
conclusions. I remember being in his office 
once at midnight, when he had a great pile 
of papers before him. He said he must go 
through them all before he slept. His 
capacity for work was prodigious. 

In company with Mr. Putnam, I saw 
much of the Judges of the Supreme Court, 

[175] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

with all of whom he had an intimate ac- 
quaintance. Two good stories I heard at 
dinner at Judge Gray's are w^orth recording. 
One Judge Gray told of the English Judge 
Jessel. He had a very loquacious barrister 
before him one day. When the latter was 
pouring out a flood of words, the Judge asked, 
"Have you been before any other court with 
this argument?" "Yes," he replied, "but 
the Judge stopped me." " He did," said the 
Judge, "how did he do it?" 

William Allen Butler, who was at the 
table, told of a judge who complained of 
insomnia. He said he had been unable of 
late to sleep on the bench. 

Mr. Chamberlain displayed his well- 
known acuteness in discussion, but in re- 
peatedly affirming that Mr. Bayard had 
given ground to suppose that we were to 
consider general commercial relations, in 
spite of Mr. Bayard's assertions and proofs 
to the contrary, he pushed his remarks to 
the verge of discourtesy. 

Sir Charles Tupper, with bluntness de- 
fending the unjustifiable Canadian pro- 
cedures, often found himself w^ithout any 
apparent disturbance by his inconsisten- 
cies in advocating measures one day which 
he opposed on the next day. In his fervour 
of debate he could not conceal the fact, 

[176] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

though he often denied it, that his great 
aim was to compel us to remove the duty 
on fish so that his countrymen might have 
access to our markets. 

The British Commissioners, after the 
completion of the Treaty, wished us to take 
up with them the Alaska boundary and the 
Behring Sea questions. We w^ere not pre- 
pared to do so, and therefore declined. 

On the initiative of Senator William F. 
Vilas of Wisconsin, on March 2, 1895, an 
Act was passed by Congress authorizing the 
President to appoint three Commissioners 
to confer with Commissioners to be ap- 
pointed by Canada or Great Britain con- 
cerning the feasibility of the construction 
of canals which would enable vessels en- 
gaged in ocean commerce to pass from the 
Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean. 

On November 4, President Cleveland an- 
nounced the appointment as Commission- 
ers of myself, as chairman, Hon. John E. 
Russell, of Leicester, Massachusetts, a for- 
mer member of Congress and Lyman E. 
Cooley, C.E., of Chicago, Illinois, an engi- 
neer of high repute. The Dominion of 
Canada appointed as its Commissioners, 
Oliver A. Howland, M.P.P., of Toronto, 
Thomas C. Keefer, C.E., of Ottawa, and 

[177] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Thomas Monro, C.E., of Coteau Landing. 
The last two were engineers who had long 
been in the service of the Dominion gov- 
ernment. 

On January 15, 1896, the American Com- 
missioners took the occasion of the annual 
meeting of the Lake Carriers' Association 
to hold its first meeting in Detroit. We 
took a large amount of testimony from 
shipowners, masters, and merchants, who 
were much interested in our work. 

On January 18, we held a joint meet- 
ing in Detroit with the Canadian Com- 
missioners and marked out as far as was 
possible the plan which w^e proposed to 
pursue. We afterwards held another joint 
meeting at Niagara Falls, Ontario. The 
Canadian Commissioners co-operated with 
us most heartily there and afterwards, and 
furnished us from the public offices at 
Ottawa a large amount of valuable ma- 
terial, and made some special surveys to 
assist us. 

As the problems to be studied were largely 
problems of engineering, Mr. Cooley was 
authorized to establish an office in Chicago 
and secure competent assistants to gather 
from all available sources the data required 
and prepare maps and plans. As only 
$10,000 were appropriated for the expenses 

[178] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

of the Commission, we could not make 
special surveys, but merely collate and study 
the information which could be gathered 
from various sources, and draw^ our con- 
clusions. This work of course fell mainly on 
Mr. Cooley, who proved most competent. 

The investigation proved to the Com- 
missioners of deep interest and, in their 
opinion, of great importance. It convinced 
us of the practicability of establishing deep- 
water communication between the Great 
Lakes and the Atlantic, and of the immense 
value to our nation and to the world of 
accomplishing the task. Whoever reads 
the interesting report prepared for us by 
Mr. Russell and examines the facts set 
forth by Mr. Cooley in his Exhibits, ap- 
pended to the Report, will, I think, be also 
convinced. 

President Cleveland transmitted the 
Report to Congress with warm commenda- 
tions and recommended further appropria- 
tions for the continuance of the work. 
The Report with accompanying documents 
was published by the Government in 1897. 
But as no appropriations were made, the 
Commissioners proceeded no further. Per- 
haps the task may be taken up after the 
Panama Canal is finished. If so, the work 
of our Commission may prove of service. 

[ 179 ] 



VIII 
SUMMER TRIPS TO EUROPE 

On two occasions I have spent the sum- 
mer vacation in Europe, chiefly in England. 
In 1886, my wife and I went abroad, with 
the purpose of dividing the summer be- 
tween London and the cathedral towns. 
In 1891, Mr. Hazard and I went to Lon- 
don as delegates to the first Pan-Congre- 
gational Council, and afterwards went to 
the Baths at Wildungen in Waldeck, and 
to the Wagner Festival at Bayreuth. 

What I am about to write is rather in 
confirmation of what Henry James said to 
me in London in reply to my inquiry how 
he found so great a charm in the life of 
that city. His answer was that the charm 
lies in the fact that there one sees so much 
life. *' In Paris," he remarked, " one finds 
clever men within their limits. Here one 
sees more of many men and of very marked 
character." 

Though in both visits I was in London 
only six weeks, and in midsummer, and in 
no official capacity, I met or heard dis- 
courses from a good number of interesting 

[180] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

men. This was in part due to the fact that 
the American Minister, Edward J. Phelps, 
and his wife were intimate friends of my 
wife and myself and were in London in 1886. 
At their hospitable table we met Robert 
Browning. He was a short, rather stout 
man with a cheery face, and was very 
simple and cordial in manner. However 
obscure is some of his writing, he was lucid 
and animated in conversation. He said 
his living in Italy was due to the delicate 
health of his wife. He spoke at some 
length of the stammering public speech of 
Englishmen, w^hich he thought was due to 
an excessive consciousness and pride. He 
said when he was a boy, speeches were com- 
mon at ordinary dinner parties. He him- 
self had a great aversion to making a speech. 
He gave an interesting anecdote of the 
effect once of inability to make a speech. 
A motion was pending in the House of 
Lords to alter the old law, which for- 
bade a person charged with murder to have 
counsel, and so compelled him to defend 
himself. A venerable peer attempted to 
advocate allowing such a man to have coun- 
sel. He found himself at a loss for words. 
He could not go on. "You see, my Lords," 
he said, "my condition. Although I know 
you are all indulgent to me, you observe I 

[181] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

am embarrassed to express myself. Sup- 
pose now I were on trial for murder. Any 
innocent man accused of that crime might 
be in my plight." The situation was so 
impressive that his view prevailed. 

In answer to our urgent request that he 
come to our country and meet his many 
admirers, he gave no encouragement, though 
he expressed a most grateful appreciation 
of the favour shown to his works in the 
United States. 

One of the most interesting men I met at 
the Pan-Congregational Council was Rev. 
John Brown, D.D., Pastor of the Church of 
Bedford, in which Bunyan preached, and 
author of an excellent biography of Bunyan. 
With him we visited Bunyan's cottage at 
Elstow. He informed me that Bunyan's 
family had lived in that village for cen- 
turies. He said he knew descendants of 
Bunyan more than fifty years old, who had 
never read "Pilgrim's Progress." 

Dr. Brown told some stories of the wit 
of Dr. Magee, the Archbishop of York. 
Among them were these two. A man, with 
whom he was discussing, said, "I am not so 
stupid as I may look." To which the Arch- 
bishop replied, "For that give God thanks." 
When he went to York to be consecrated as 
Archbishop, some woman passing by him, 

[182] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

exclaimed, **What an ugly mouth!" He. 
overhearing it, said to her, "You are right, 
madam, but it has made my fortune." 

Dr. Brown and other preachers spoke 
freely of the social disadvantages under 
which young men and young women in 
dissenters' famihes found themselves. He 
informed me that one Anglican clergyman 
in his neighbourhood had recently in a 
sermon or public address declared that 
persons married by any but an Anglican 
clergyman were living in adultery. When 
Dr. Brown called the attention of the 
clergyman's bishop to this the clergyman 
was reprimanded. 

At a tea given by the Bible Society at 
their house, I saw what was said to be the 
largest collection of Bibles in the world, 
and was told the following story of the 
origin of that renowned society: 

A Welsh girl, named Mary Jones, walked 
many miles to beg a Bible of a minister. 
He had none to spare for her. She went 
home weeping, but on his promise to get 
one for her, she walked again twenty-five 
miles to procure it. The minister came to 
London, told the story, and persuaded men 
to found the society. 

I went one morning at 8 o'clock to break- 
fast with the directors of the Tract So- 

[183] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

ciety at their rooms in Paternoster Row. 
These directors, busy men, fifteen in num- 
ber, meet every Tuesday morning at that 
early hour for breakfast and the transac- 
tion of the business of the society. They 
were criticizing tracts which they had all 
carefully read. Here, as at the meeting of 
the directors of the Bible Society, I was 
deeply impressed by the fidelity of these 
officers of the societies in the discharge of 
their duties. 

Calling at the Foreign Office on Mr. 
Henry (afterw^ards Sir Henry) Bergne who 
was the English Secretary to the Fisheries 
Commission on which I served in 1887-8, 
I w^as introduced to Sir Edw^ard Herstlet, 
and was shown by him into the rooms where 
the Treaties are preserved. I seemed to 
have a large part of the history of modern 
Europe in my hands as I held an Official 
copy of the great Treaty of Vienna of 1815 
and one of the Treaty of Paris of 1856. 

As an illustration of the remark of Henry 
James about the life in London, I may say 
that attending one afternoon a garden 
party given by Lord and Lady Jersey, I 
met and was presented to, among others, 
Mr. and Mrs. Lecky, Lord Sherbrooke, Sir 
Richard Webster, then Attorney General, 
now Lord Chief Justice, Prof. Ray Lankester, 

[184] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

and Mr. Knowles, editor of the Nineteenth 
Century Magazine, On the return in the 
train, an EngHsh gentleman, speaking of 
the peerage just granted to Bass, the 
brewer, repeated Labouchere's quotation 
concerning the elevation of Allsop, '' Surgit 
quidquid amarumJ' 

Mr. Ouless, the painter, told a good story 
in my hearing. Poole, the fashionable 
tailor, having lent money to some of the 
nobility, was sometimes invited by them 
into company. Once, when he had been to 

Lord 's, he was asked what he thought 

of the gathering. He replied that it was 
well enough, but the company was a little 
mixed. "How," some one said. "What 
could you ask.^ You could not expect they 
would all be tailors." 

Perhaps the most striking illustration of 
freedom of speech in England is witnessed 
in Hyde Park on Sunday afternoon, when 
the advocates of every opinion are allowed 
such unrestrained liberty of utterance in 
the hearing of any persons they can induce 
to listen. At various stands on one occa- 
sion I heard the following speakers. No. 1 : 
A Spirituahst; No. 2: An atheist; No. 3: 
Anti-government, anti-rent, anti-everything 
existing, a French revolutionist in manner 
and in appearance; No. 4: A lay preacher 

[185] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of the gospel. No. 5: A reformed drunk- 
ard; No. 6: An anti-vivisectionist; No. 7: 
A rabid and radical socialist. The spirit- 
ualist and the lay preacher had the largest 
audiences. But the authorities interfered 
with none of them. There was no disorder. 

In 1891, Mr. Hazard and I made a visit 
to the Continent after the close of the 
Council in London. We spent some days 
in Brussels, where Mr. Hazard had import- 
ant business relations. I asked prominent 
men there why Belgium, a neutralized coun- 
try, charged itself with the expense of an 
army of a hundred thousand men. Their 
answer was that the Great Powers virtually 
require it to prevent any state from taking 
advantage of a defenceless condition, and 
furthermore, the officers drawn from the 
higher classes have influence enough in the 
government to maintain an effective force. 

We spent some time at Wildungen in 
Waldeck, where are excellent springs with 
medicinal qualities like the waters at Carls- 
bad. The waters, however, are cold and 
most palatable. Some five thousand vis- 
itors, mostly German, were there, among 
them being our friend Carl Schurz. These 
springs apparently are not widely known in 
this country, though they deserve to be. 
From this little state came Bunsen, the his- 

[186] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

torian, Kaulbach, the painter, and Ranch 
and Drake, the scnlptors. I took long walks 
into the surrounding country, which is in- 
habited by well-to-do peasants. They have 
comfortable houses, but the manure heap, 
apparently the accumulation of months, is 
often in the front yard. Sometimes the 
residence is in the second story, the barn 
occupying the first story. 

We went to Bayreuth to attend the Wag- 
ner Festival. Knowing that Jean Paul 
lived in that town for years and died there, 
I sought to find his house. The cabman had 
no knowledge where it was. Entering the 
principal bookshop, I asked a young woman 
who was in charge, where the house was. 
She was unable to tell me. Soon strolhng 
down the street, not fifty rods from the 
bookshop, I came on the house, a fine three- 
story dwelling with an inscription on it, 
giving me the information I desired. Verily, 
I thought, the prophet was without honour 
in his own country. We found his statue 
and the grave of Liszt without inquiry. 



[187] 



IX 

THE MISSION TO THE OTTOMAN 

EMPIRE 

In the spring of 1897, 1 was asked by Rev. 
Dr. Storrs, President of the American 
Board of Commissioners of Foreign Mis- 
sions, if I would accept the position of 
Minister to Japan or Turkey, if desired by 
the President. Mr. WiUiam E. Dodge, of 
New York, speaking for the Presbyterians, 
asked the same question with respect to 
Turkey. They both had in mind the in- 
terests of Christian missions. I gave both 
to understand that if the offer of such a 
position came unsought by me, I w^ould give 
it consideration. 

In April, Senator McMillan, at the re- 
quest of President McKinley, inquired by 
telegraph whether I would accept the po- 
sition in Turkey. After some correspond- 
ence, I finally wrote that I would accept, 
provided I could return at the end of a 
year or remain longer if I chose. While, 
with my wife and daughter, I was on a 
visit to New Orleans, my name was sent 
to the Senate and promptly confirmed. On 

[188] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

my return home the Regents gave me leave 
of absence for a year from October. The 
Legislature of Michigan passed a vote of 
thanks to the President for the appoint- 
ment. 

On May 6, I visited Washington and had 
interviews with the President, Secretary of 
State John Sherman, and other officers of 
the State Department, all of whom received 
me very cordially. But two despatches 
were received from Mr. Terrell, our minis- 
ter at Constantinople, which led me to ask 
the President to excuse me from serving. 
The first said the report had come to him 
that while in the South I had charged 
Russia with fomenting disturbances in Tur- 
key, and that on this account my relations 
with the Russian Ambassador would be 
strained. The second stated that the Sul- 
tan objected to me because I, like most of 
the American missionaries, belonged to the 
denomination of Congregationalists. I did 
not desire to go with these difficulties as a 
handicap. But Secretary Sherman tele- 
graphed my denial of the truth of the first 
despatch. It being soon ascertained that 
the Sultan had made the mistake of con- 
founding the denomination of Congrega- 
tionalists with such an organization as the 
Congregation of the Jesuits, with which he 

[ 189 ] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

had controversies, our Secretary in charge 
of the Legation telegraphed that the objec- 
tion to me was withdrawn. 

I may as well say here that no one of the 
European Ambassadors was more cordial 
to me on my arrival than Mr. Nelidoff, the 
veteran Russian Ambassador and that the 
other ambassadors in answer to my in- 
quiries, assured me that they never heard 
the least criticism of me from Mr. Nehdoff, 
or from any Embassy or Legation. 

Furthermore, I may say, that the Sultan 
was always most affable to me in my inter- 
views with him, even when I had to discuss 
some missionary questions. In fact, I 
never saw any traces of the difficulties 
which Mr. Terrell reported. 

The President and the Secretary declined 
to listen to my requests to be excused from 
service. I decided to go to my post, and 
made my arrangements to sail on July 17, 
for Havre. My wife and I left home on 
July 14. We reached Paris at an early 
hour on July 26. While we were there, 
floods in Austria destroyed the railways, by 
which we had planned to go to Constanti- 
nople. So we were compelled to go to 
Marseilles and take the steamer. 

On the way south we visited Avignon, 
Nimes and Aries. After a comfortable voy- 

[190] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

age on the Messageries steamship '' Senegal," 
we reached Constantinople late in the after- 
noon of the 18th. Mr. Riddle, the Secre- 
tary, Mr. Short, the Consul, and a Turkish 
official, representing the Grand Vizier, were 
at the wharf to greet us. In the Legation 
launch we proceeded at once to Therapia 
and took lodgings for the summer at the 
Palace Summer Hotel. The next morning a 
messenger from the Sultan called to greet me. 

As soon as convenient I made my calls 
on the Ambassadors and Ministers. Baron 
Calice, the Austrian, was the Dean, a most 
courteous and amiable man with an Eng- 
lish wife. His long service at that post 
made his knowledge of affairs valuable to 
us all. Nelidoff, the Russian, soon trans- 
ferred to Rome, had been considered the 
most influential representative. He was 
succeeded by Zinovieff , a shrewd man, whose 
whole career had been made in Asiatic 
service. He informed me that Russia 
trained its men in diplomatic service, 
especially for Asiatic or for European posts. 
He had been much in Persia and under- 
stood the operations of the Oriental mind. 
Russia treats Turkey as belonging to the 
Asiatic department. 

Sir Phihp Currie, the British Ambassa- 
dor, had been taken, as Pauncefote was, 

[191] 



REMINISCENCES OP 

directly from the Foreign Office for dip- 
lomatic service. He was a man of the 
finest presence; but he could not get on 
with the Sultan. His English love of jus- 
tice and honesty made him impatient with 
the artful devices and the wickedness of the 
Turkish officials. He was obliged to see 
Great Britain losing its influence and could 
not conceal his indignation at the policies 
of the Turkish government. But it was 
refreshing to hear his noble Enghsh spirit 
express itself. 

Lady Currie, known in her own country 
as an author of fiction, was a woman of 
great brightness of mind and of singular 
charm of manner. 

Monsieur Cambon, the French Ambassa- 
dor, was a most attractive personality. 
He had been at his post in the time of the 
massacres and exerted himself to the ut- 
most to induce his government to interpose 
by force to put an end to the cruel violence. 
He thought the Great Powers missed a rare 
opportunity at that crisis. He had the 
finest powers of a French conversationalist. 
I always counted it a happy hour when I 
could meet him. He is most worthily 
representing his country in London. He 
is an elder brother of the ambassador who 
won such favour with us at Washington 

[192] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

during the Spanish War, in the dehcate 
position of being the medium of communi- 
cation between us and Spain, and who now 
holds the difficult position of French Am- 
bassador at Berlin. 

The German Ambassador on my arrival 
was Baron Saurmar-Jeltsch, who had been 
Minister at Washington, a large, bluff, 
blue-eyed hunter, who liked kilHng wild 
boars better than formal dinners. But he 
was soon succeeded by that able and dis- 
tinguished statesman, Marschall von Biber- 
stein, a man of high intelligence and great 
force of character. The German Emperor, 
who has sought and not without success to 
secure the influence in Turkey once wielded 
by Great Britain, sent this strong and vigi- 
lant man to carry out his pohcy. He soon 
made his power felt, and until the depo- 
sition of the Sultan, Abdul Hamid, was 
undoubtedly the leading ambassador at 
Constantinople. 

Signor Pansa, the Itahan Ambassador, 
was a very agreeable gentleman, but Italy 
apparently did not find her voice considered 
of as much weight as that of the other 
Great Powers. 

My relation with the Spanish Minister, 
Urrutia, was very friendly. He was trans- 
ferred after a few months and succeeded by 

[193] 

14 



REMINISCENCES OF 

a Marquis, who had been at St. Petersburg. 
In that capital, as is well known, social 
functions begin at a very late hour, some- 
times at midnight. He was asked after he 
had been in Constantinople some weeks, 
how he found life there. "Oh," said he, 
"in many respects very well. But I must 
say it is the dullest place I have been in, 
after 2 o'clock in the morning." He was 
a most affable gentleman, and although the 
outbreak of the Spanish War compelled 
him and me to break off formal social 
relations, we never sacrificed our friendly 
feelings. 

At the time of my arrival the ambassa- 
dors of the six Great Powers were in ses- 
sion with an Ottoman representative for 
the purpose of adjusting the relations of 
Turkey with Greece and the Balkan States. 
The Congress did not accomplish very im- 
portant results. The diplomatic wits said 
it served to show " rimpuissance des Grandes 
Puissances.''^ But in part at least owing 
to their influence a satisfactory Treaty of 
Peace between Turkey and Greece was 
negotiated. 

It is well known that German officers, 
loaned to the Sultan by the German Em- 
peror, really planned the campaign against 
Greece nominally conducted by Edhem 

[194] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

Pasha. One of the German officers who 
was wounded in the war told me that the 
Turkish victories might easily have been 
made more decisive if the German advisers 
could have persuaded the Turkish com- 
mander to get up and have any fighting 
before noon. 

On September 3, I was received by the 
Sultan. The whole staff of the Legation 
and the Consulate, w^ere present. Court 
carriages came for us. The Assistant In- 
troducer, Ghabit Bey, who had called on 
me in the name of the Sultan, on my arrival, 
occupied the carriage with me and my 
dragoman. The soldiers at all the guard 
houses saluted as we passed. Arriving at 
the Imperial Palace, the Yildiz Kiosk, 
Munir Pasha, the Chamberlain, met us. 
Officers in brilliant uniform were gathered 
in the large reception room. The Secre- 
tary of Foreign Affairs, Tewfik Pasha, then 
escorted me to a smaller room, where the 
Sultan was standing by the side of a small 
table. He wore his semi-military blue 
frock coat with no binding and wore many 
jewels and decorations. I read my speech 
in Enghsh, of which one copy in English 
and one in French had alreadv been sent. 
The Turkish Secretary then read a Turk- 
ish version. The Sultan replied in a low^ 

[195] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

but pleasant voice, substantially recipro- 
cating the wishes and sentiments I had 
expressed. The Secretary also in a gentle 
tone rendered the Sultan's speech in French. 
The bearing of the Sultan was affable and 
cordial. 

I then w^ithdrew to the salon, where ciga- 
rettes and light refreshments were served. 
The great hero of the Russo-Turkish War, 
Osman Pasha, and other notable persons 
were present. After a little we returned to 
the Legation and served refreshments to 
the guests. 

On the next day I made my calls on the 
Ministers of the Porte. I will say a few 
words of those with whom I had subse- 
quently to do business. 

The Grand Vizier, Khalil Rifaat Pasha, 
was an old man whose mind seemed to 
act very slowly, but who in all my dealings 
with him was just and fair and obliging. 

The Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Tewfik 
Pasha, was a most affable and attractive 
man. I sometimes thought he was too 
ready to agree with me and to say yes to 
my requests, especially when it proved he 
had not the power to make good his prom- 
ises. He had been Ambassador at Berhn, 
and there married a German lady. I often 
wondered whether in accepting his hand 

[196] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

she supposed she was to be admitted to 
diplomatic society in Constantinople. As 
a matter of fact she was obliged, like all 
Turkish wives, to live in seclusion. 

Zahdi Pasha, the Minister of Public In- 
struction, w^as an amiable elderly man with 
whom I had much pleasant conversation 
on education. He regretted the failure of 
many officials to appreciate the value of 
general education. He complained that 
this greatly hindered his work, in which he 
seemed deeply interested. I may relate 
an incident which illustrates the devout- 
ness of the pious Turks, which they are not 
ashamed to have us know. On calling at 
his office one day at 3 o'clock, I saw him 
kneeling and praying. I proposed to the 
porter that I should withdraw until he was 
free to see me. *'0h no," said he, "come 
in and take a seat." I did so. The Min- 
ister on his prayer rug continued some ten 
minutes at his devotions, then arose, and 
without any ceremony greeted me and gave 
attention to my business. One could hardly 
have such an experience wuth a cabinet 
officer in a Christian land. 

He rendered me a valuable service in 
instituting a search for an ancient manu- 
script, alleged by the author of a book, 
written in Missouri, to be in the library of 

[197] 



REMINISCENCES OP 

Santa Sophia. This book is entitled the 
"Archko Volume." It professes to give 
the contents of manuscripts called the 
Acta Pilati, found in the Vatican, and con- 
firmed in the library of Santa Sophia, giving 
many details concerning the early life and 
the trial and execution of Jesus. It was 
published in Philadelphia by the Anti- 
quarian Book Company in 1896. It bears 
on the face of it the appearance of a fraud. 
A gentleman sent me the book with the 
request that I ascertain whether there is 
in the library of Santa Sophia such a manu- 
script or book as is referred to by the author 
as the authority for the narrations he gives. 
The Minister informed me that the library 
in question was under his special care and he 
would order a most thorough search. A few 
weeks later he informed me that the search 
had been made and that there was no trace 
of any such work in the library. His report 
did not surprise me. 

Said Pasha, President of the Council, had 
been formerly Secretary of Foreign Affairs 
and Ambassador to Berlin, and had been in 
public service all his life. He was a fine 
story teller and had a good sense of humour. 
He spoke with much interest of John A. 
Kasson, who represented us at Berlin. 
Among his stories was one of his handling 

[198] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

of a missionary case when he was Governor 
at Salonica. An American woman teach- 
ing a missionary school had been annoyed 
by a young Turkish hoodkim throwing 
stones at her school house and made com- 
plaint to the Governor. He summoned the 
lad and was satisfied of his guilt. He then 
sent for the young woman, told her that 
he desired to frighten the fellow by threat- 
ening him in her presence with very severe 
punishment, and suggested that if she would 
then interpose and ask for his release the 
effect on the public would be most salutary, 
and insure her and her colleagues against 
further annoyance. She had the good 
sense to agree to this treatm.ent of the case. 
His programme was carried out and there 
was no further interference with missionary 
work while he w^as in Salonica. 

Of all the ministers, he and Tewfik Pasha 
alone spoke French. Munir Pasha, the 
Sultan's interpreter, spoke French. It was 
generally believed that the Sultan, who 
when a lad was some time in Paris, could 
understand it fairly. But he insisted in 
using Turkish altogether in his interviews 
w^ith the diplomats. 

The Porte under Abdul Hamid had lost 
the power which it had under his predeces- 
sors. He insisted on reviewing the whole 

[199] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of their work before action was taken on 
any affair of the least consequence. There- 
fore after working for weeks to carry a 
measure through the Cabinet, the foreign 
representative found his work only just 
begun. And even with the best purpose on 
the part of the Sultan to expedite business, 
it was simply impossible for him to accom- 
plish it. And if he did wish to delay it, he 
had a ready excuse. The diplomatic body 
with one accord were greatly dissatisfied 
with the course which had to be taken, 
even with urgent business. Moreover there 
had grown up a sharp rivalry, one might 
almost say hostility, between the Porte and 
the Secretaries and other officials at the 
Palace. It was currently reported and 
widely beheved that the Secretaries at the 
Palace had to be bribed if important 
measures were to be attended to with any 
promptness. 

One day, after the completion of a little 
transaction which had dragged along for 
weeks, I said with some impatience to 
Tewfik Pasha, "Why do you have such ways 
of doing business? I have heard that you 
are cousins to the Chinese. And you do 
have this same habit of provoking delay in 
finishing a task which in America we should 
do in fifteen minutes. Why is it?" With 

[200] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

his amiable smile, which partially disarmed 
me, he replied, "Well, I can only say that 
is our way." And that was the only ex- 
planation. 

Of course I had several interviews with 
the Sultan on business. Although subse- 
quently our Legation w^as raised to an 
Embassy on the alleged ground that the 
Minister had not the same facility of access 
to the Sultan which the Ambassadors en- 
joyed, I had no occasion to make that com- 
plaint. I found no difficulty in securing an 
audience when it was necessary. The bear- 
ing of the Sultan was always affable. He 
heard with attention what I had to say and 
replied politely. On one occasion, during 
an audience, a messenger entered in great 
excitement with what appeared to be an 
important message. I offered to withdraw. 
The Sultan detained me. He gave some 
orders to the messenger. He then informed 
me that the message was that his sister's 
palace on the Bosphorus was on fire and 
that he had given orders to have the fire- 
men hasten to the palace and to have his 
sister and her children brought to his pal- 
ace. Then he proceeded to preach a brief 
but excellent sermon to the effect that when 
misfortune comes we must do our best to 
avert it, but having done that in resigna- 

[201] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

tion and faith, must leave all to God. I 
ventured to reply that his doctrine would 
be deemed good in all lands. 

He remarked playfully to me one day 
that I was the only American Minister who 
ever came to his court who spoke French. 
In this I think he must have been in error. 

When he learned that I was going to 
Jerusalem and Damascus, without any re- 
quest on my part he sent orders to his 
officials in the Holy Land to greet me and 
aid me in my journey. They did this to 
an extent which was sometimes almost em- 
barrassing. I mention his courtesies, be- 
cause I cannot but criticize and condemn 
many features of his government. 

Though he was averse to allowing capital 
punishment, it was believed that his morbid 
fear of assassination and his dread of revo- 
lution led him to severe punishment of 
mere boys and to the exile to remote prov- 
inces of some of the best men in the empire. 
Two cases of the unjust punishment of boys 
came to my personal knowledge. A lad 
who had been a student in Robert College 
found his funds exhausted so that he could 
not complete his education there. Having 
heard that the Sultan sometimes gave 
scholarships in a Turkish school, one Friday 
he pushed through the military lines which 

[ 202 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

guard the Sultan on his way to the mosque, 
and threw into the carriage a petition for the 
scholarship. It is a tradition of great an- 
tiquity in Oriental lands that any subject 
may petition the sovereign. When the lad 
came home, one of his comrades asked him 
how he succeeded in approaching the Sul- 
tan's carriage. The lad rephed with fatal in- 
discretion, " Why, it was easy enough. I was 
so near him I could have shot him." This 
unhappy remark being repeated, he was 
arrested, charged with threatening the life 
of the Sultan, convicted and sentenced to 
fifteen years' imprisonment. All efforts of 
influential friends to secure a modification 
of the sentence were in vain. 

The other case occurred in the Turkish 
Medical School in Constantinople. Some 
men of revolutionary spirit gained access to 
the school and scattered incendiary cir- 
culars about the building. One of these 
papers was found in the room of a young 
student from Smyrna, though he afiirmed 
through no agency of his. He was ban- 
ished, but his poor mother could not learn 
where. In her despair she made, through 
a lawyer whom I knew, a request of me that 
I would forward through the Sultan's Sec- 
retary a petition to His Majesty, that she 
might be informed where he had been sent, 

[203] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

and that she might be allowed to go to the 
same place and see him occasionally. Find- 
ing that under the usages at the Palace I 
could without impropriety oblige her, I did 
forward the petition, which was one of the 
most pathetic papers I ever read. But I 
never heard of any results. 

Many absurd law^s and regulations in 
force in the capital at the time of my resi- 
dence were believed to be due to the Sul- 
tan's fear. For instance, though the city 
had nearly a million inhabitants there was 
no local mail. One had to send letters by 
special messengers to persons in the city. 
It was said that though there had formerly 
been mail facilities, the Sultan suppressed 
them because he received so many threaten- 
ing postal cards and because conspirators 
could by mail easily mature dangerous 
schemes. 

I had two singular controversies with the 
customs officers to handle. An Englishman, 
after visiting the hospital connected with 
one of our American mission stations, gen- 
erously sent out from London a thousand 
dollars' worth of medicines as a present for 
the physician to use in his merciful work. 
In the invoice was a small quantity of car- 
bolic acid, a remedy used in the treatment 
of sore throats. It happens that it can 

[204] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

also be used in the preparation of the explo- 
sive gun cotton. On that account the whole 
shipment was stopped and threatened with 
confiscation. I laboured for some time 
with the officers, explaining to w^hat an inno- 
cent and even beneficial use the dangerous 
article was to be put and urging them at 
least to seize that and sink it in the Bospho- 
rus and let the rest of the medicines go on 
to their destination. Suddenly, as I thought 
I w^as on the point of success, the customs 
official, with whom I had been labouring, 
was succeeded by another. He took up 
the matter de novo. As though nothing 
had been said he sent me a note, informing 
me of the arrival of this shipment of medi- 
cines, saying the duty paid on it was so 
much, but that the fine on the acid was so 
much more, and he would thank me for a 
cheque for this excess and that the whole 
shipment had been confiscated. So I had 
to start all over again, and take as many 
more weeks to secure the release. 

One comical case occurred. Robert Col- 
lege had appointed a young graduate of 
an American college to teach the Oriental 
boys not only some branch of book learning 
but also the American game of base ball. 
In examining his baggage, the custom offi- 
cers came upon a pitcher's mask. ''^Yhat 

[205] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

is this?" they asked themselves. "Some 
new kind of revolutionary weapon? " They 
detained it as a strangely suspected article. 
After a week's deliberation and full explana- 
tion by the American consul it was per- 
mitted to enter. 

The Sultan watched with much interest 
the events of our war with Spain and 
especially the naval contests. He asked 
me many questions about them. Finally 
he inquired if I could tell him how he could 
procure some ships like ours without the 
intervention of middle men, who were so 
given to cheating him in contracts. I told 
him that the builder of the "Oregon," 
which had performed its wonderful feat of 
coming round Cape Horn and going di- 
rectly into action, was then in St. Peters- 
burg, and if he desired, I would ask him by 
telegraph to come to Constantinople and 
confer with him. I endeavoured to impress 
him with the belief that very much of our 
success depended on the man behind the 
gun. His mind was evidently turned more 
to our cannon than to our men. He said 
he had ordered some of the cannon. It is 
well known that he did finally order an 
ironclad of the Cramps of Philadelphia. 

In this connection I may mention a sin- 
gular fact about the attitude of the middle- 

[ 206 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

class Turks towards us in the Spanish War. 
The sympathies in most of the Embassies, 
except the British, were rather against us, 
though they were never manifested to me 
in an unpleasant way. The newspapers 
published in Constantinople, except one 
edited by a Frenchman, w^ere rather un- 
friendly to us. That one I kept well in- 
formed of our views. But rather to my 
surprise I found that the main body of the 
Turks in the capital leaned to our side. I 
was puzzled to know why. Therefore I 
asked a friend who was familiar with the 
Turkish language and with many of the 
people to ascertain the cause of their atti- 
tude. "Why," they said to him, "don't 
you remember that three hundred years ago 
these Spaniards drove the Mohammedans 
out of their land? Allah is great. The time 
of punishment for them has come." Not 
improbably the Sultan shared their feelings. 
At the outbreak of the war I asked him 
if he proposed to publish a proclamation of 
neutrality. He said he would follow the 
example of other nations and that the Great 
Powers guaranteed the neutrality of the 
Dardanelles at all times. I asked how 
about furnishing munitions. "Oh," he re- 
plied, "everyone knows we never spare so 
much as a pistol." 

[207] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

It will be remembered that the Spaniards 
sent some ships of war as far as Port Said, 
on the way to Manila. They could not 
proceed farther without procuring coal. 
Tewfik Pasha asked me what international 
law required of his government about allow- 
ing the Spanish ships to coal. Of course 
I told him his duty was to allow them to 
take coal to return home but not to go on. 
The Spanish ships returned home. I have 
always supposed he knew the law without 
asking me. But I am not quite certain 
about it. 

As I have spoken with emphasis of the 
dilatoriness of the Turkish government, I 
may properly credit them with commend- 
able promptness in one case. During the 
war with Greece the lights on the Turkish 
coast were extinguished to prevent the 
Greek war ships from approaching. In 
December, 1897, after the close of the war, 
the United States gun-boat, the Bancroft, 
was coming from Athens into the port of 
Smyrna in the evening. The captain saw 
the outer light at the mouth of the harbour 
burning, and so concluded that the port 
was open at night and kept on his w^ay. 
As he was passing a small fort on an 
island in the harbour, he was fired on by 
musketry without any notice. He stopped 

[208] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

his engines and sent a boat with an officer 
towards the fort, and the boat was fired on. 
The Bancroft anchored till daylight and 
then proceeded into the harbour and re- 
ported to Admiral Selfridge, who was there 
with the war ships, the Brooklyn and the 
Olympia. The Admiral made his com- 
plaint to the governor, who referred him to 
Constantinople. He sent a despatch to me 
and with it one of the bullets which had 
fallen on the deck of the Bancroft. 

I at once sent a spirited despatch to 
Tewfik Pasha, demanding an apology and 
the punishment of the officers of the fort 
at Smyrna. The Imperial Council met the 
next day and decided to meet all my de- 
mands and to dismiss the officers at fault. 
The Admiral expressed himself as satisfied, 
and the affair was ended. 

Whether action would have been so 
prompt if our ships under Admiral Selfridge 
had not been lying at Smyrna I cannot 
say, but I doubt it. Unhappily perhaps 
for some other business in my hands, owing 
to the outbreak of the Spanish War the 
Olympia was just then sent through the 
Suez Canal to Manila, where she had a 
part in achieving Dewey's notable victory, 
and the Brooklyn was ordered home for 
duty on this side of the sea. 

[209] 

15 



REMINISCENCES OF 

My belief is that if Selfridge could have 
remained at Smyrna with those vessels, 
our claims against the Turkish government 
would without great delay and without the 
firing of a gun have been settled. When 
I was asked to go to the East, largely for 
the purpose of procuring a settlement of our 
claims, with my knowledge of Oriental 
ways I asked, and the President promised, 
that the vessels should be ordered to the 
Turkish coast. These claims were chiefly 
for the destruction of the property of Ameri- 
can missions by Turkish soldiers. As they 
were under the control of the government, 
and in a legal sense its agents, and the 
property for which restitution was asked 
was destroyed not by rioters but by them, 
the responsibility of the government could 
not be denied. In fact, when I presented 
this argument to Tewfik Pasha, the Secre- 
tary of Foreign Affairs, he did not and could 
not deny its validity. On the contrary, he 
told my dragoman that they w^ould will- 
ingly settle our claims were it not for the 
embarrassment caused by the larger claims 
of the other nations. When the Great 
Powers were in conference they decided to 
present their claims not jointly but sepa- 
rately, in notes substantially identical. The 
various Ambassadors assured me that they 

[210] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

were quite willing I should present ours at 
once and one of them said he should be very 
glad if we succeeded in collecting without 
delay. With the outbreak of the Spanish 
War and the withdrawal of our vessels, the 
Foreign Office relegated the question to the 
limits of indefinite discussion and procras- 
tination, which lasted beyond my term of 
service. A settlement of the claims was 
finally made after some years more of delay, 
by adding the sum due to a contract price 
for the construction of a ship of war by the 
Cramps, this excess to be turned over by 
the builders to the mission board whose 
property had been destroyed. 

The resort to espionage was a most seri- 
ous blot upon the administration. The 
spies of the Sultan were every^where. One 
Turk said to me the spy business was the 
most prosperous of any. I was tissured 
that spies were sitting at the dinner tables 
of the principal hotels, to overhear the con- 
versation of the guests. AVith one against 
w^hose visits I had been warned I had an 
amusing adventure. He was a handsome, 
dignified Arab, who had been in England 
long enough to talk English fairly well. 
He introduced himself to me, savin"' he had 
been Mavor of Jerusalem and was now try- 
ing to procure from the government a con- 

[211] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

cession for the construction of a system of 
waterworks for that city. He regretted, he 
informed me, to find that the government 
was so corrupt that he had no hope of secur- 
ing his concession except by bribing a whole 
row of high officials. It was refreshing to 
him to turn aside from these representatives 
of a corrupt and tyrannical government and 
pay his respects to the representative of a 
pure and honest democracy. 

Supposing his object to be to draw from 
me some remark derogatory to the Sultan, 
which he could report to my disadvantage, 
I ventured to remark that a monarchy pre- 
sided over by a just sovereign was an edify- 
ing spectacle and that even in republics 
there were found sometimes corrupt men in 
office. He seemed surprised at my remarks 
and proceeded to eulogize republican gov- 
ernments. I continued my commendations 
of enlightened monarchies. The conversa- 
tion ran on in this way for half an hour, 
when he bade me adieu, but as I flattered 
myself without any game for his bag. 

The venality of some of the courts was 
also a fearful weakness in the government. 
I asked one of the best lawyers, an English- 
man who had been practising twenty years 
in Constantinople, whether the courts had 
improved in his time. *'They have de- 

[212] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

cidedly grown worse," was his reply. He 
then gave me the following illustration from 
his recent experience: 

**I was counsel for a Liverpool merchant 
to collect a sum due him from an Armenian 
merchant here for a bill of goods. Not 
long after the trial began I saw evidence 
that one of the judges had been bribed by 
the defendants. I asked and procured 
his dismissal from the bench. Another 
man w^as appointed and the trial was re- 
sumed. After a little I ascertained that 
this man was bought up by the defendants. 
I arrested proceedings and asked for the 
removal of the new judge. Thereupon the 
Armenian came to me and offered to settle 
for half the face of the bill. "But why," 
asked my informant, "do you ask me to 
accept half the sum due? You know you 
owe the whole." "Oh, well," repKed the 
merchant, "but it has cost me half the 
amount of the bill to buy these two judges." 

Some of the religious ceremonies one 
sees in Constantinople are of much interest. 

On January 9, we went to the Yildiz to 
see the Pilgrims start for Mecca with 
gifts. A Mohammedan acquires much 
merit by making the journey. The streets 
leading to the scene were lined with people. 
The concourse of women was exceptionally 

[213] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

large. Dropped down on the grassy banks, 
wearing their white wraps, they resembled 
a flock of pigeons. As we looked on, a long 
procession of venerable ulemas poured forth 
from the mosque, where they had been to 
worship. They wore robes of every shade 
of green and a gilt band around the turban. 
The procession was headed by several 
camels and by a larger number of donkeys, 
laden with the gifts. Most of these gifts 
were covered by canopies of multi-coloured 
stuffs. But the last donkeys carried just 
such old hair-covered trunks as I used to 
see in the country in Rhode Island in my 
boyhood. As the procession started, a 
sham fight was carried on, representing an 
attack on the caravan, but a few brave 
Moslems successfully defended it. The old 
priests with much difficulty and considerable 
boosting mounted horses, each of w^hich 
was led, and closed the procession. The 
day was perfect. The wild Arab music, 
the real or simulated enthusiasm of the de- 
fenders of the caravan, the gay trappings 
of the camels, the large concourse of the 
faithful, all made a fine Oriental pageant 
of semi-barbaric nature. It is however 
always well understood that the procession 
will not march overland to Mecca, but will 
be borne by steamer to Arabia. 

[214] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

On May 2, we attended the reception by 
the Sultan of the high rehgious and civic 
officials. This is held in the great hall of 
the Dolmar-batsche Palace. The diplo- 
matic visitors, including the ladies, occupied 
the gallery. We were asked to be present 
at half -past six in the morning. The Sultan 
sacrifices a sheep but not in our presence. 
The ceremony began by the Sheik-ul-Islam 
approaching His Majesty and receiving a 
kiss on his shoulder. Then priests of high 
rank came forward and kissed the hem of 
the Sultan's coat. Those of lower rank 
kissed a tassel fastened to the Sultan by 
a gilt band and held by Osman Pasha. 
These and the civil officers all wore their 
official dress. The Sultan extended his 
hand a httle as if to seem to lift up most 
of the priests from their bowing position. 
But in recognition of the salaams of the 
other officials he made not the shghtest 
response by movement or gesture. A band 
played in the gallery during the whole 
ceremony. Tea, cakes, and fruits were 
served to us visitors during the long and 
rather monotonous ceremony. Munir 
Pasha, the Sultan's interpreter, came at 
the close to thank us. 

I attended a remarkable and rather re- 
pulsive ceremony of the Persians at their 

[21o] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

Khan. They are known as the Shiite 
branch of Mohammedans. They beheve 
that Ah, the son-in-law of Mohammed, was 
crowded out of the cahphate by his rivals 
for years and his son Hassein was mur- 
dered by them. Annually they have this 
celebration in honour of Hassein. The ex- 
citement is so great on the occasion that 
not unfrequently scenes of violence are 
witnessed. On this account it was not 
deemed prudent for me to take my wife 
with me. 

It was already dark when I arrived. The 
place was brilhantly hghted. Round and 
round the building in the centre of the 
sciuare, which is bordered by houses and 
shops of Persians, the procession marched 
from sunset till about 10 o'clock. It con- 
sisted of three principal sections of about 
sixty or seventy persons in each. One was 
made up of men beating their breasts as 
they marched before what seemed to repre- 
sent a turbeh or tomb of Hassein, and re- 
sponsively shouting something about him. 
Another section carried chains with which 
they flagellated their bare shoulders. The 
third section carried swords. They were 
clad in white cotton gowns, and as they 
marched and shouted they cut their scalps 
and faces with their swords till their necks 

[^16] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

and gowns were saturated with blood. One 
child five years old, riding a horse, did the 
same, and I even saw an infant in arms 
with a knife and its face and head appar- 
ently slashed. This last section grew more 
and more excited as the evening wore on. 
From time to time men became so weak 
that they were led away to be washed and 
cared for. Near the close of the evening 
one man appeared to be raving crazy. 
There were musicians, flag bearers and light 
bearers in the procession. 

I understand the demonstration to be one 
of grief for the death of Hassein and also 
of penance. Many of the Persian by- 
standers w^ept and some sobbed aloud. In 
the houses adjacent, groups of Persians 
were looking on in gravity. Some of them 
were weeping, some were partaking of 
refreshments. 

The Turkish soldiers w^ere present in 
force to keep order. One might well be- 
lieve that otherwise these frantic zealots 
would run amuck on the Giaours present. 
I was told that in Persia the demonstra- 
tions on such an occasion were more violent. 

My wife and I frequently visited the Insti- 
tutions, of which Americans may justly feel 
proud — Robert College and the Woman's 
College. The former was estabhshed by 

[217] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

that gifted missionary Cyrus Hamlin, en- 
dowed largely by Mr. Christopher Robert, 
of New York, and administered for so many 
years by Rev. Dr. George Washburn. It 
gave a good collegiate education of the 
American type to a large number of Arme- 
nian, Bulgarian and Greek students, and 
thus incidentally imbued them with the 
Christian spirit of regulated liberty. Sev- 
eral of the men most prominent in develop- 
ing the civic life of Bulgaria were graduates 
of the college. Perhaps no foreigner in the 
Empire was so well informed about the 
political condition of South-eastern Europe 
as President Washburn. So highly was his 
opinion valued by the British government 
that he rarely passed through England with- 
out being asked by the Premier or the 
Foreign Secretary for an interview. A few 
Turkish students were in the college classes, 
but owing to the attitude of the Imperial 
authorities not many ventured to attend. 
Enghsh was the language of instruction in 
both colleges, though the eastern languages 
were taught. 

The Woman's College had girls of the 
same nationalities as Robert College. Oc- 
casionally a Turkish girl was sent there by 
her parents. On one occasion I attended a 
class in Enghsh Literature. It happened 

[218] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

that the subject on that day was Long- 
fellow's "Evangeline." I was surprised at 
the command of our language by these 
Oriental girls, and especially by the fact 
that the most proficient was a Turkish girl, 
the daughter of a Turkish official in the 
Treasury Department. I was told that she 
had entertained her father in his leisure 
hours by translating at sight to him pas- 
sages from Shakespeare and from Holmes' 
"Autocrat of the Breakfast Table." She 
had translated into Turkish an American 
book, "Abbott's Mother at Home," if I 
remember the title correctly, a work in- 
tended to instruct mothers in rearing their 
children, and her proud father had incurred 
the expense of printing it and distributing 
a thousand copies among the soldiers re- 
turning from the Greek War. It is an 
interesting fact that this Woman's College 
owes its imperial authorization to Admiral 
Farragut. It had long been asked for in 
vain. He was informed of this on his 
visit. When he was received by the Sultan, 
in the friendly conversation of their inter- 
view, he asked the Emperor to give the 
college the sanction of an irade and his 
request was granted. 

The summer of 1898 we spent in the 
island of Prinkipo, in the spacious mansion 

[219] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of Mr. Azarian, and with our launch made 
many beautiful excursions to the adjacent 
islands and to the main land. 

On July 4, we invited all the Americans 
in Constantinople and all the members of 
the British embassy. One of the British 
gun-boats was placed at the service of the 
Americans living on the Upper Bosphorus, 
so that our company numbered about sixty. 
We pinned little American flags on all, British 
and Americans indiscriminately, and had a 
merry celebration. Unhappily the news of 
the capture of Cervera's fleet did not reach 
us until the next day and even then was 
denied at the Spanish Legation. 

One day we went to Bulwer's Island, 
some seven miles away from Prinkipo. It 
is named after Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer, 
who negotiated with us in 1850 the noted 
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. He built here two 
castles of stone in Norman style. Earth- 
quakes have made ruins of them, though 
one can see the elaborate carved decora- 
tions of the doorways and windows. It is 
said that his life here was of such a char- 
acter as to lead to his recall and caused Lord 
Palmerston to give his successor the advice 
"Beware of Islands." 

The adventure of an English neighbour 
of mine on Prinkipo is perhaps worth re- 

[ 220 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

lating. Long resident in Constantinople, 
he had been an anonymous correspondent 
of a London newspaper, through which he 
made known to the pubhc many facts con- 
cerning the Turkish government, which the 
Sultan preferred not to have proclaimed. 
The tidings came to my friend that the 
Sultan was preparing to banish him from 
the country. He had large interests in 
Constantinople which made it very unde- 
sirable for him to leave. He bethought 
himself of this device. 

He sent for an influential Turkish official 
to whom he had once rendered an important 
service and w ho had promised to reciprocate 
the service if opportunity ever presented 
itself. He said to his friend, "I am think- 
ing of going to England, and running for 
Parliament. I know of a district in which 
I can be elected." His friend besought him 
to remain, but immediately went away and 
spread the news among the officials at the 
Palace. They saw that in Parliament he 
could do much more harm than in Con- 
stantinople. Nothing more was heard of 
the scheme to banish him. 

Since during the great fast of Ramazan 
it is impracticable to transact important 
business with the Turkish government, my 
wife and I left Constantinople on January 

[221] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

26, 1898, on my sixty days' leave for a 
journey to Egypt and the Holy Land. We 
went up the Nile to Philae, spent several 
days in Cairo, then went to Joppa and Jeru- 
salem, to Jericho and Hebron, to Beirut, 
where w^e visited the American College as 
the guests of President BHss, to Baalbec 
and Damascus, calling on the way home at 
Smyrna and making an excursion to Ephe- 
sus, finally reaching Constantinople on 
March 23. At every town which we visited 
in the Holy Land, the governors and mili- 
tary and civic officials, in obedience to the 
Sultan's orders, welcomed us on our arrival, 
and during our stay rendered us any assist- 
ance in their power. 

One of the most agreeable excursions we 
made while in Turkey was to Broussa in 
fine days in May. The situation is most 
picturesque on heights from which one 
looks over a wide expanse of fertile valleys 
to the Sea of Marmora. Here Osman, the 
founder of the Empire, planted himself. 
Here are his tomb and the tombs of some 
of his successors. Here Phny the younger 
was praetor, and here he wrote some of his 
letters which have come down to us. While 
we were there, a regiment which belonged 
to Broussa and the neighbourhood re- 
turned from the Greek War. The streets 

[222] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

were crowded with men, women and chil- 
dren. We expected to hear the soldiers 
greeted with cheers. To our surprise, not 
a sound of a voice was heard. The march 
of these stalwart and sun-burned warriors, 
returning from a triumphant campaign, was 
made through the principal street in dead 
silence everywhere. I inquired what was 
the explanation of this strange scene. I 
w^as told that the government had never sent 
home or allowed to be sent home during 
the war any tidings concerning these men. 
Consequently the relatives were waiting in 
anxiety now to see who, if any, were miss- 
ing. In this suspense there was no impulse 
to cheer. Those who were rejoiced to see 
their kindred returning were- restrained 
from a public demonstration by a delicate 
regard for the feelings of those to whom the 
day brought disappointment and sorrow. 
This explanation made the spectacle very 
pathetic. 

I had an interview with the Acting Gov- 
ernor-General Ilalib Ibrahim Bey. He had 
been Vali at Sivas at the time of the mas- 
sacres and had been removed on the demand 
of the British Ambassador. But he now 
talked to me in the most liberal spirit of 
leaving freedom to all as far as possible. 
He sent the military commandant and his 

[223] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

dragoman two miles out to meet me on my 
arrival and a squad of cavalry all the way 
to the sea on my return. 

On August 5, I had my farewell audience 
with the Sultan. He talked mainly on our 
war with Spain, and asked me to request 
our Secretary of the Navy to commend to 
him some ship-building firms with whom he 
could deal directly. He thanked me for 
having maintained so cordial relations with 
him. 

On August 13, we embarked on an Aus- 
trian steamer for Trieste. Some forty or 
fifty of our friends, missionaries, teachers, 
and diplomats gathered at the wharf to 
bid us adieu. Our Turkish coachman and 
servants evinced much feeling. It was not 
without emotion that we parted with our 
faithful servants and our numerous friends. 



[224] 



X 

THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNI- 
VERSITY OF MICHIGAN 

In 1869, to my surprise I was invited to 
visit the University of Michigan and de- 
cide whether I would accept the presidency 
of the institution which Dr. Haven had 
resigned. My wife accompanied me, and 
we spent two or three days at Ann Arbor. 
We were much impressed with the vigour 
and the promise of the University. But on 
returning to BurHngton, I found that the 
men who had ralHed generously to the sup- 
port of the college would be sorely disap- 
pointed if I left them then. I decided that 
it was my duty to decline the invitation to 
Michigan. So I devoted myself with all 
my energy to the continuance of my work 
in Vermont. In 1871, the invitation to 
Michigan was renewed with much earnest- 
ness. I felt that I had discharged my duty 
to my Vermont friends and that the college 
could move on fairly without me. I had 
some hesitation about undertaking so large 
a responsibility as that at Michigan. One 
day when I mentioned this to a friend who 

[225] 

16 



REMINISCENCES OF 

had very large business interests, he said, 
"I have found if you have a long lever it is 
as easy to raise a large load as to lift a small 
weight with a short lever." 

After careful consideration I decided to 
accept the invitation to Michigan. In 
compliance with the request of the Regents 
of the University, I attended the Com- 
mencement at Ann Arbor on June 28, 1871, 
and delivered my Inaugural. I then re- 
turned to Burlington and finished the 
academic year which terminated on August 
3. I removed to Ann Arbor with my 
family early in September. 

I found that largely under the influence 
of John D. Pierce, Superintendent of Public 
Instruction at the time of its organization, 
of Isaac E. Crary, and of Henry P. Tappan, 
its first President, the University had been 
inspired to a considerable extent by Ger- 
man ideals of education and was shaped 
under broader and more generous views of 
university life than most of the eastern 
colleges. Mr. Pierce, a graduate of Brown 
University in the class of 1822, was settled 
as a Presbyterian Home Missionary in 
Marshall. Mr. Isaac E. Crary, a gradu- 
ate of Trinity College, Hartford, was a 
lawyer in the same town. Both were much 
interested in public education. Mr. Pierce 

[226] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

was appointed the State Superintendent of 
Public Instruction, the first officer with that 
title in the United States. Mr. Crary was 
a member of the Convention that framed the 
State Constitution of 1835, and as Chair- 
man of the Committee on Education 
drafted the Article on Education in the 
Constitution. Cousin's famous Report on 
Public Instruction in Prussia had fallen 
into the hands of Mr. Pierce and formed 
the subject of much discussion between 
him and his neighbour, Mr. Crary. Mr. 
Pierce told me that he could take me in a 
grove in Marshall to the very log on which 
they often sat and conferred together on 
this remarkable book, which gave them the 
idea of a state system of schools with a 
university at its head. That idea gave 
shape to the constitutional Article on Edu- 
cation and to the legislation afterwards 
enacted in accordance with it. When Dr. 
Tappan was made President in 1852, he 
brought from Germany, where he had 
studied, ideals quite in harmony with those 
which Pierce and Crary had cherished at 
the outset, and with his vigorous mind he 
left a deep impression on the life and spirit 
of the University. The Institution had 
in its Faculties at the time of my arrival 
men of marked abilit3^ I will name some 

[227] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

of the more prominent of the professors 
who are no longer Hving. 

Dr. Henry S. Frieze, Professor of Latin, 
for the two years prior to my coming Act- 
ing President, was a man of rare quahties, 
a passionate lover of art and of music, a 
scholar of large and varied attainments 
and of the finest literary taste, an inspiring 
teacher and a most winsome spirit. His 
influence on students and on his colleagues, 
in fostering the love of classical learning 
and in the diffusion of high and broad 
university ideals through all the West, 
causes his memory to be cherished with 
peculiar respect and affection. 

Rev. Dr. Benjamin F. Cocker, Professor 
of Philosophy, had had a romantic life. 
A Methodist circuit preacher in York- 
shire in early life, he lived for years among 
the miners in Australia. On his voyage 
from that country he was wrecked on an 
island in the Pacific, inhabited partly by 
savages. After a narrow escape with his 
family he arrived in this State in utter des- 
titution. Assigned to the care of a small 
country church, his talent soon made him 
known and secured his call to important 
churches, and finally to the chair in the 
University. His opportunities for gaining 
an education had been slender, but by his 

[228] 



JAMES B. ANGELL * 

marked ability and his great industry he 
had overcome in large degree the limitations 
of his earlier years, though he never ceased 
to lament them. Both as a preacher and a 
teacher he had a singular charm of voice 
and manner which, added to his clearness 
and simplicity in discussions of the prob- 
lems of philosophy, made his instructions 
a dehght to his pupils. He is remembered 
by them with abiding affection and grati- 
tude. 

Edward Olney, Professor of Mathematics, 
also had a unique history. He was never 
in school but a few weeks. Of mathe- 
matics he seemed to have from childhood 
an intuitive comprehension. His geometry 
he learned while following the plough. He 
drew the figures with chalk on the plough 
beam and mastered the demonstrations 
while travelhng in the furrow. Though 
probably his attainments did not at last 
reach much beyond the range of the higher 
instruction in the undergraduate course, he 
had a most unusual gift as a teacher. He 
not only made his instruction simple and 
clear, but what is not common in colleges, 
he made the study of mathematics a fa- 
vourite study of the great body of students. 
He had a manly frankness and honesty of 
character which often gave to his expres- 

[229] 



5 REMINISCENCES OF 

sions the air of bluntness, but commanded 
the highest respect of his pupils and culti- 
vated in them a spirit of manliness and 
honesty kindred to his own. He was a man 
of most earnest religious nature and was a 
power for righteousness both in college and 
in the community. 

Charles Kendall Adams was Professor of 
History. He had acquired his enthusiasm 
for historical study under Andrew D. White, 
when he filled the Chair of History in this 
University. Mr. Adams had recently re- 
turned from study in Germany where he had 
become familiar with the Seminar method, 
in introducing which he afterwards was 
the pioneer in American universities. Mr. 
Adams was even then greatly interested in 
university problems and was carefully 
studying all experiments in university ad- 
ministration, both in America and Europe. 
He subsequently made good use of his 
knowledge of universities as President of 
Cornell University and of the University 
of Wisconsin. 

Moses Coit Tyler was Professor of Rhet- 
oric and English Literature. He was al- 
ready master of that attractive style which 
lent such a charm to everything that he 
wrote and inspired his classes with a love 
for the best in literature and for purity and 

[230] 



JAMES B. ANGEL L 

vivacity in their essays and speeches. In 
his private study he was already showing 
that deep interest in American History and 
the early American authors which gave 
shape and colour to his later works. He 
had a fine sense of humour which enlivened 
his instruction and made him a most agree- 
able companion. 

Alexander Winchell, like Professors of 
Science in most American colleges at that 
time, was giving elementary instruction in 
Geology, Zoology, and Botany, but by his 
pow^erful imagination and brilliant elo- 
quence w^as widely known as one of the 
most successful popular lecturers on science. 
He was afterwards President of the Syra- 
cuse University. 

James C. Watson, Professor of Astron- 
omy, was a man w^hose mathematical intu- 
itions were near to genius. The son of an 
Irish carpenter, he was one of the finest 
products of the Michigan System of Pub- 
lic Education, for he received his entire 
training in the public schools of Ann Arbor 
and in the University. While he was yet 
a student he made a telescope and with it 
discovered a comet. While still a young 
man he discovered asteroids and wrote a 
text book on Astronomy, which gave him 
an enviable reputation among astronomers 

[231] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

here and in Europe. His college teachers 
said that as a student he was almost as apt 
in languages as in mathematics, and if he 
had cultivated them as a profession, might 
have won distinction in that field. He had 
unlimited capacity for work. It seemed as 
though he could observe all night and then 
study all day. In teaching he had none of 
the methods of the drill master. But his 
lecture or his talk was so stimulating that 
one could not but learn and love to learn 
by listening. I have heard his pupils say 
that sometimes while discussing an intri- 
cate problem he would have an entirely 
new demonstration suddenly flash upon 
his mind as by inspiration and then and 
there he would write it out upon the 
blackboard. 

George S. Morris, a man of the widest 
reading, was the Professor of Modern Lan- 
guages. He had already translated Ueber- 
weg's History of Philosophy. He afterwards 
welcomed the opportunity to give his whole 
time to teaching philosophy here and in the 
Johns Hopkins University, leaving in both 
institutions a profound impression upon his 
classes. 

Edward L. Walter was then giving in- 
struction in Latin. Later he had charge 
of the work in German and in the Romance 

[ 232 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

Languages. He was a master alike of an- 
cient and modern literatures. Gifted with 
remarkable powers of acquisition, he was 
one of the most successful of teachers. We 
were robbed of him while in the prime of his 
strength by the sinking of the steamship 
Bourgogne. 

M. L. D'Ooge, Professor of Greek, was 
absent in Europe, but the department was 
in the hands of Elisha Jones and Albert H. 
Pattengill, than whom better classroom 
teachers of the classics were to be found in 
no American college. 

In the Medical Department, which was 
crowded with over five hundred students, 
were Professor Corydon L. Ford, doubtless 
the best lecturer in the country on anatomy, 
as it was then taught; Dr. Sager, a man of 
large scientific attainments for his time; 
Dr. Palmer, so long the eflBcient Dean; Dr. 
Prescott, the distinguished chemist, and a 
group of brilliant younger men. 

In the Law Department were the three 
great teachers, who had guided its fortunes 
from its foundation, Thomas M. Cooley, 
James V. Campbell, and Charles I. ^Yalker. 
Never was a law school so fortunate as this 
was in beginning its work and continuing 
it for so many years under such gifted 
instructors. Charles A. Kent, a worthy 

[233] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

coadjutor, had recently joined them. It 
was not strange that the school attracted 
students from all parts of the land. 

Professors Cooley and Campbell were on 
the Supreme Bench of the State. The 
Court, by the wisdom of its decisions, had 
already won the highest respect of the legal 
profession throughout the country. Judge 
Cooley had also won renown by his great 
work on Constitutional Limitations. He 
seemed to have an intuitive perception of 
legal relations. He was a man of inde- 
fatigable industry. Beyond all men I have 
known, he possessed the power of writing 
rapidly and with such accuracy that no 
reader could misunderstand his meaning. 

Judge Campbell was a scholarly man of 
wide reading, and of a graceful style in 
writing or speaking. He was most famihar 
with the early history of the State and es- 
pecially with the customs and traditions of 
the French population of Detroit and the 
vicinity. His narrations of the details of 
their life were as fascinating as those of the 
best French raconteurs. His lectures on law 
were diffuse, but so charming in manner, 
like his conversation, that they held the 
undivided attention of his students. 

Professor Walker was so lucid and me- 
thodical in his instruction that his classes 

[ 234 ] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

always testified to the great benefit they 
received from him. 

It will be seen that it was rather remark- 
able that a University so young as this 
should have gathered such a company of 
teachers. It was indeed a stimulating body 
for me to be associated with in my arduous 
and responsible duties. 

On my arrival I was sadly disappointed 
to find that my former teacher and old 
friend, Dr. Frieze, at whose suggestion I 
had been chosen President, had gone to 
Europe for a prolonged visit. I had relied 
on him to give me full information about 
the details of the Institution and to assist 
me w4th his wise counsels. But I received 
a warm welcome from the Faculties and the 
students. During the first few weeks, I 
attended classes to observe the methods 
and the quahty of the teaching. I found 
the instruction was for the most part excel- 
lent. In both the colleges with which I had 
been connected, we had a marking system 
for recording the quality of the students' 
recitations. Here I found none. I was 
naturally interested to observe whotluT 
without such a system students could i)e 
held to a proper standard of work. A\hen, 
after six weeks' attendance on classes, I 
heard only two students say "not pre- 

[2S5] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

pared," I was forced to the conclusion that 
as good results were secured without as with 
a marking system. Prolonged observation 
in later years has confirmed that belief, 
although probably higher technical excel- 
lence in recitation is attained by a few who 
are studying for class rank. But the appeal 
to a college student to w^ork for the sake of 
learning is an appeal of a noble sort, and if 
heartily responded to, yields a result of a 
higher order than an appeal to ambition 
for class rank. 

I was early impressed with the great ad- 
vantages both to teachers and students of 
having the three departments: the Col- 
legiate, known here as the Literary, and the 
Medical and the Law Departments all upon 
the same ground. It gave a certain breadth 
and catholicity to the views of all. The 
professors, organized as a Senate, met so- 
cially at stated intervals to listen to papers 
and discuss them, and so to consider sub- 
jects from their different angles. As there 
were no dormitories, the students of the 
different departments were thrown together 
in their temporary homes and were led to 
see that there were things worth knowing 
outside of their own special lines of work. 

I was also soon struck with the good re- 
sults of the plan adopted the year before 

[236] 



JAMES B. A N G E L L 

my arrival of bringing the High Schools 
into closer relations with the University, 
by receiving on diploma the graduates of 
schools which had been approved })y the 
Literary Faculty after inspection of them. 
This innovation on the practice of Ameri- 
can colleges was due to the fertile mind of 
Dr. Frieze, who took the idea from the 
usage of the German Universities in receiv- 
ing the graduates of the Gymnasia without 
examination of the students. In adapting 
the plan to our needs, the Faculty wisely 
made provision for a visit to the schools by 
some University Professors. I made many 
of these visits. The advantages both to 
the schools and the University were soon 
obvious. The methods of the school visited 
and the fitness of the teachers for their work 
were made known to the visitors. The op- 
portunity for suggesting improvements was 
furnished. Interviews with scholars were 
held. Frequently the visit was made the 
occasion for a pubhc address on education 
to the citizens. Conferences were had with 
the school board. An opinion could be 
formed concerning the willingness or un- 
willingness of the town to give the needed 
support to the school, for the maintenance 
of the proper standard of school work. An 
impulse was given to the public to take a 

[237] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

new interest in the school which the Uni- 
versity thought worthy of a visit. Above 
all, an intimate and friendly relation be- 
tween the school and the town on the one 
hand and the University on the other was 
established. The University was also en- 
abled to see w^hat was possible to the High 
School and was guarded against the danger 
of asking too much of the students as the 
condition of admission. 

It was thought by some that the officers 
of the school would not be courageous or 
careful in maintaining high requirements 
for the graduation of students who were to 
go to the University. It proved that with 
few exceptions they were both courageous 
and careful and that sometimes they de- 
clined to recommend students to us who 
might have entered on examination by us. 
They had a better opportunity to know the 
qualifications of students by observing their 
w^hole school course than we had in a single 
examination, in which the pupil by diffi- 
dence or accident, might not do himself jus- 
tice. After a few years of experimentation, 
we found that judging by the first year of 
college work the students received on cer- 
tificate made a better showing than those 
received on examination. Perhaps in 
nothing has the University been more use- 

[ 238 ] 



JAMES B. ANGEL L 

ful to the educational system of the State 
than in the cultivation of the friendly rela- 
tion with the schools by the introduction 
of the diploma system of admission of stu- 
dents. Our example in establishing it has 
been generall}^ followed in the West, and to 
some extent in the East, though not always 
with our precautions in making visits. 

The year before I came, the doors of every 
department of the University had, under 
the pressure of public opinion in the State, 
been thrown open to women. Most of the 
professors and of the students would have 
preferred that they should not be admitted. 
On my arrival the subject of their admis- 
sion was still under discussion. The objec- 
tions raised were, first, that women could 
not master the difficult studies of college, 
and, secondly, that the health of women 
would suffer under the strenuousness of 
college life. Experience soon showed that 
neither objection was well founded. As it 
required some courage for women to come 
at first, fortunately those who did present 
themselves were generally earnest, self- 
reliant, scholarly persons. By their dis- 
cretion and their scholarship, they won the 
respect of teachers and fellow students and 
made the path easy for those who came 
after them. A good number of them, after 

[239] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

graduation, obtained commanding positions 
in the Faculties of Women's Colleges, which 
were springing up in the East, and won 
honour for themselves and the University. 

By way of illustration I may speak of our 
relation to Wellesley College. When Mr. 
Durant, the founder of that Institution, was 
making up his first Faculty, he encountered 
difficulty in finding women with suitable 
training for filling professorships, because 
there were so few colleges where women 
could receive the proper training. Natu- 
rally, he wrote to me to inquire whether we 
had been graduating such women as he 
needed. I recommended a graduate of the 
Class of 1874 for his Chair of History. She 
proved so satisfactory that he then wrote 
asking me to recommend thereafter any 
woman whom I should deem competent. 
That greatly delighted me, and I sent him 
one after another whom he promptly ap- 
pointed. Among them finally was Alice 
Freeman who subsequently was appointed 
President and made so distinguished a 
career. 

The collegiate education of women has 
proved of great value to the schools. For- 
merly they could not easily find opportu- 
nities for training which fitted them for the 
best work in the high schools. If by any 

[240] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

means they had obtained it, they did not 
feel sure of it. They laeked the confidence 
which is essential to the success of a teacher. 
But when they had graduated in the same 
classes with the most scholarly men who 
were teaching, both they and the school 
boards had confidence in their training. 
The schools, in which a majority of the 
teachers have always been women, took on 
new vigour and life. 

The fear that the joint education of the 
sexes would lead to serious embarrassments 
proved so unfounded that it is found almost 
without exception in the Colleges and Uni- 
versities of the ^Yest. It cannot be doubted 
that the example of this University con- 
duced largely to this result, and, judging 
by our correspondence, was helpful in 
opening the doors of some European Uni- 
versities to women. 

Our friends in the East have always 
expressed surprise that most of the col- 
leges and the universities in the West have 
for the last thirty years educated the sexes 
together. They fail to see that co-educa- 
tion in those institutions was the natural 
development of the plan followed in the 
high schools of the AYest. \Yhereas in the 
high schools of the East the sexes were 
educated separately, in the West they were, 

[241] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

as a rule, educated together. Having thus 
been instructed together up to the very 
door of the college, it was no violent or un- 
natural transition for them to enter the 
college together. As in fact no serious 
objections to their joint education have 
presented themselves, the usage bids fair to 
be continued at least in the West. 

As I have always been fond of teaching 
and have thought it was well for the Presi- 
dent of a College or University to teach, I 
soon availed myself of the opportunity 
which presented itself to give some instruc- 
tion in International Law and in Political 
Economy. I continued to do so until I 
went to China in 1880. On my return I 
resumed the work in International Law and 
continued it till I resigned the Presidency. 

In order to keep in close touch with stu- 
dents, especially those of the Literary (Col- 
legiate) Department, for several years I 
discharged the duties now assigned to a 
Dean. I registered all new comers; I 
granted (or refused) excuses for absence. 
I took the initiative in examining all cases 
for discipline. The result was that I knew 
every student and could call him by name 
up to the time of my departure for China in 
1880. Of course it was easy for me to do 
this in Vermont. But it was more diffi- 

[242] 



JAMES B. A N G E L L 

cult when I had to do wiili eight Inindrod 
students. The infhience and the pleasure 
it gave me was a great reward for the efl'ort 
required. I wonder that the rresick^it even 
of a great University wilhngly foregoes the 
satisfaction which conies from sueli an 
intimate relation with even a portion of his 
students as comes from giving instruction 
in some subject. 

In 1873, largely through the influence of 
Mr. Claudius B. Grant, at that time a 
Regent of the University and a ]\Iember of 
the Legislature, we persuaded the Legisla- 
ture to give us the proceeds of a twentieth- 
mill tax. This established a most useful 
precedent. In later years our twenti(^th- 
mill tax was raised first to one-ciuhth, 
then to one-quarter, and then to thrtn^- 
eighths of a mill. This proved to be a far 
better plan than the voting of special 
appropriations for a number of objects. 
It spared the legislative committees and 
the whole Legislature the trouble of scruti- 
nizing a large number of specific recjuests. 
It also enabled the University authorities 
to use the funds granted them more ell'ec- 
tively and more economically. For fre- 
quently it happened that before the term 
of two years for which the appropriations 
were made had elapsed, it became ai)parent 

[243] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

that the money granted for some particular 
object could be more wisely devoted to 
some other purpose. Furthermore it is 
quite essential to wise administration that 
the authorities of a University should be 
able to lay plans for some years ahead; and 
resting on a tax bill which experience shows 
is not likely to be repealed, they can adopt 
wise policies for the future, when they might 
not be able to do so if they had to depend 
on specific appropriations to be renewed at 
every session of the liCgislature. 

I had occasion to visit the Legislature at 
several sessions to make known to our Com- 
mittees, and sometimes to the whole body, 
our needs, and several times the whole 
Legislature visited the University. I wish 
to bear witness to the courtesy with which 
I was always received at Lansing, and the 
hearty interest in the Institution which the 
members of the Legislature always evinced 
on their visits to us. 

Eastern critics of the system of State 
support of universities have often assumed 
that the institutions would become em- 
barrassed by being entangled in the con- 
troversies of party politics. It can be 
affirmed that such has never been the case 
in the support or control of this University. 
Different parties have been in control in 

[ 244 ] 



JAMES B. AN CELL 

this State during the hfe of the Institution. 
But we have fared equally well, whichever 
party was in power, and no political con- 
troversy in the Legislature or in the State 
at large has ever embarrassed us. 

The example of our Legislature in passing 
a tax bill, providing in a lump for the needs 
of the Universitv, has been followed bv 
several states to the great benefit of their 
Universities. 

In 1875, the Legislature made appro- 
priations for the establishment of the 
Homeopathic Medical School, the College 
of Dental Surgery, the School of [Mines and 
a Professorship of Architecture. These new 
departments of work were at once organ- 
ized. Unhappily in 1877 the Legislature 
did not continue the appropriations for the 
School of Mines and the teaching of Archi- 
tecture and we were obliged to drop the 
work. This illustrates the difficulty of ad- 
ministering a University which depends on 
biennial appropriations. 

In 1879, under the pressure of urgent re- 
quests which I had made for some years, 
the Regents established the Chair of the 
Art and Science of Teaching, to aid in pre- 
paring our graduates to teach in our schools 
or to superintend schools. Our action was 
severely criticized for a time by some college 

[24o] 



E EM IN I S CE N CE S OF 

men who maintained that teaching could 
not be taught through formal instruction. 
But only a few years elapsed before nearly 
every university of standing, including those 
which had criticized us most severely, ap- 
pointed Professors of Education or Peda- 
gogy. As a consequence, so-called Schools 
of Education with large equipment have 
grown up in some of these institutions. 

In the late seventies a large freedom in 
the election of studies in the Literary De- 
partment was granted; the course of study 
in the Medical Department was extended 
from two years of six months to two years 
of nine months, and the School of Pharmacy 
was organized. During the decade from 
1870 to 1880, the progress of the University 
in all departments had been most satis- 
factory. 

This was especially gratifying because 
from 1875 to 1879 an unpleasant contro- 
versy was raging which threatened havoc 
to the Institution. The accounts of the 
Chemical Laboratory showed a deficit for 
which the Director of the Laboratory or an 
Assistant Professor was apparently respon- 
sible. If the decision of the question of re- 
sponsibility had been left to the Regents 
alone, it would probably have been soon 
settled. But for reasons which need not 

[ 246 ] 



JAMES B. A N G E L I. 

be discussed here, persons outside of the 
University became interested and a bitter 
contest ensued, involving the Legishiture, 
the Courts and the Pul)Hc. It is obvious 
now that the difficulty was largely due at 
the outset to the defects in the system of 
bookkeeping in the Laboratory. It was ade- 
quate in the days when the number of stu- 
dents was small, but was not well suited to 
meet our wants when the classes had become 
very large. After the controversy was 
ended, it gave w^ay to a better system. It 
is a good proof of the strong hold the Uni- 
versity has on the respect and affections of 
the people that the fierce and prolonged 
contest left it unharmed. 

During the last thirty years there has 
been a constant and steady movement for- 
ward in the enlargement and enrichment of 
the work in all the departments. The En- 
gineering which was carried on as a part of 
the Literary Department has been devel- 
oped into a separate Department, compris- 
ing Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, Chemical, 
and Marine Engineering, in close relation 
with Architecture and having nearly three 
hundred more students than were found in 
the entire University when I came here. 
The introduction of the elective system into 
the Literary Department added greatly to 

[247] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

the variety of its work. Meantime a large 
graduate school and a summer school of 
more than a thousand students have grown 
up. The course required for graduating has 
been extended in the Law School and the 
Dental School to three years and in the 
Medical School to four years of nine months 
each. The requirements for admission to 
the professional schools have been materi- 
ally raised. Excellent hospitals for the use 
of the medical schools have been constructed 
and upon the highly advantageous plan of 
being entirely under the direction of the 
Medical Faculties. This allows students 
access to the patients with a freedom quite 
impossible in hospitals otherwise conducted. 
The idea of establishing hospitals on this 
basis originated here, and is now being 
adopted wherever practicable by medical 
schools. 

It is not intended to give here a history 
of the University. But a few statistics 
may properly be given. There were three 
Departments in 1871 ; there are now seven. 
The members of the Faculties then num- 
bered 35; now they are about 400. The 
students then numbered 1110; the last 
Calendar (1910-11) registered 5383. The 
libraries then contained 25,000 volumes; 
now they have 260,000. The income was 

[248] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

then $104,000; now it is $1,170,000. The 
number of graduates from 1871 to 1009 is 
about 20,000, and the number of non-grad- 
uates approximately 17,000. They are 
found in every state and territory of the 
Union and on every continent of the globe. 

My wife and I have received great 
pleasure in our home from the visits of 
distinguished men and women who have 
come to address the University. It seems 
proper to give reminiscences of some of 
these visits. 

Matthew Arnold, in his last visit to 
America, accompanied by his wife and 
daughter, was our guest. It may be re- 
membered that, when lecturing in the 
Eastern cities, he was criticized and even 
ridiculed for his manner of delivery. Being 
near-sighted, he had a reading-stand as 
tall as he was, and to his annoyance his 
manner in darting his head close to it at 
each sentence was compared to a bird 
pecking at his food. This fact led him, 
it was said, to take some lessons in elocu- 
tion from a competent teacher. His appear- 
ance on our stage was one of the first after 
this instruction. lie was received by our 
audience with great favour, and his success 
was so marked that he spoke to me with 
much satisfaction of his reception. 

[249] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

A business manager accompanied him 
on this Western tour. It was the custom 
of the railways in those days to give special 
rates to theatrical companies. Mr. Arnold 
told me with great glee that when the 
conductor of the train took the tickets 
from the manager, he exclaimed, "Oh! 
this is the Arnold troupe, is it.^" He 
continued during his visit to address his 
wife and daughter as the Arnold troupe. 

Having passed by Seneca Lake on his 
journey, he was apparently much inter- 
ested in the fact that the lake bore the 
name of the great Roman philosopher. 
He was rather disappointed when I in- 
formed him that the lake took its name 
from the Seneca tribe of Indians and that 
the word Seneca is in that case of Indian 
origin. 

Miss Edith Arnold, Mr. Arnold's niece, 
was my guest when she came to dehver 
a lecture on the Religious Novel. It was 
an address of high literary merit. She 
told me that a short time before his death 
Mr. Gladstone had a prolonged interview 
with her sister, Mrs. Humphrey Ward, 
in which he discussed at length with the 
author the religious doctrines set forth 
in the novel "Robert Elsmere." As Miss 
Arnold is a pronounced advocate of woman 

[250] 



JAMES B. ANGEL L 

suffrage and Mrs. Ward is a leader on 
the other side, I asked her how lliey got 
on together in their consickTation ol' that 
subject. ''Oh," she said, "our (UU'erence 
does not in the least disturl) our relations. 
For of course my sister does not under- 
stand the subject at all." 

Dr. J. M. L. Curry, who was prominent 
on the Southern side in our Civil Vsiw and 
subsequently our Minister to Spain and 
Agent of the Peabody Education Fund 
for the aid of schools in the South, gave a 
very valuable Commencement Address for 
us. He and I sat up till midnight con- 
versing on the race problems in the South. 
He manifested the most generous spirit 
towards the blacks. At last, after pacing 
the floor, he exclaimed with great fervour, 
striking the table with his hand, "We can- 
not see the whole of the future. But one 
thing w^e can know^ It must be eternally 
right to educate the negro and to Chris- 
tianize the negro." It is fortunate that 
so many Southerners have come to agree 

with him. 

Among the many interesting stories he 
told of his experiences in travelling through 
the South, especially among the "poor 
whites," as they are called, of the moun- 
tain region between Virginia and Kentucky, 

['251] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

I venture to repeat this. In a very 
humble dwelHng he noticed that the 
mother called her daughter who was wait- 
ing on the table *'Ralgy." The name 
was so new to him that before he left he 
asked the mother where she found that 
name. In reply the woman brought an 
empty bottle which had contained patent 
medicine. She pointed to the label which 
announced that the medicine would cure 
neuralgia and other ailments. She thought 
neuralgia was a new and striking word, and 
so she had named the child "neuralgia," 
which in familiar address they had shortened 
to "Ralgy." 

Henry M. Stanley, the African traveller, 
and his wife were most entertaining guests 
on the occasion of his visit here to lecture. 

Our Law students have for many years 
celebrated Washington's birthday by secur- 
ing an address from some eminent man. 
The February before Mr. Cleveland's second 
election to the Presidency, he was the orator 
of the day. I invited a number of the 
prominent citizens of both political parties 
to meet him at my house at luncheon. An 
immense throng from various parts of the 
State came to hear his address, which was 
very felicitous. In the evening a public 
reception was held by him in the city, and 

[252] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

on the next evening another was held in 
Detroit. The result was that the Demo- 
cratic party in Michigan raised witli nuieh 
spirit the cry for his nomination to the 
Presidency. And they have always boasted 
that the impulse thus given led to his 
nomination and election. 

However that may be, his visit to Ann 
Arbor certainly had one result of some con- 
sequence. Years after I asked him how 
it happened that he chose for his perma- 
nent residence Princeton rather than New 
York. He rephed, "AVhen I visited Ann 
Arbor, vou remember that vou drove with 
me through several of the streets of your 
city. And when I saw so many modest 
and pleasant homes, I said to myself it 
is in a college town with its simple life 
that I will try to find a home when I am 
through with public life. I never lost 
sight of that thought. Hence my decision 
to hve in Princeton rather than in New 
York." 

One of my more recent visitors was the 
British Ambassador James Bryce, whose 
versatihty was admirably displayed. In 
the evening he gave a most scholarly ad- 
dress to the Phi Beta Kai)pa Society on 
Culture. The next noon he addressed the 
Detroit Chamber of Conunerce on ^Nlunici- 

[253] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

pal Government, in which his great famil- 
iarity with municipal experiments and 
discussions, both European and American, 
appeared; in the evening he addressed the 
University Club in Detroit on the changes 
in American college and university life 
since his first visit to our country. In 
this address he showed a knowledge of 
our academic life that could not be sur- 
passed by any of our college presidents. 
All these addresses were given without a 
scrap of paper before him. One was re- 
minded of the offer ascribed to Mr. Carnegie 
to bet a miUion dollars that Mr. Bryce 
knows more than any other man in the 
world. 

Many other eminent visitors might be 
named, among them Chinese and Japanese 
ambassadors, foreign missionaries. Univer- 
sity Presidents, Mr. Justice Miller and Mr. 
Justice Harlan of the United States Supreme 
Court, Secretary Bayard, Mr. Roosevelt, 
when Governor of New York, Sir Frederick 
Pollock, and Charles A. Dana, editor of 
the New York Sun. These names may 
suffice to illustrate how stimulating the 
life of a University and especially the life 
in the President's home are made by the 
guests who come to lend inspiration to 
the Institution. 

[254] 



JAMES B. AN CELL 

In considering the relation of the Uni- 
versity to the State, I have always had two 
great ends in view^ 

First: I have endeavoured to induce 
every citizen to regard himself as a stock- 
holder in the Institution, who had a real 
interest in helping make it of the greatest 
service to his children and those of his 
neighbours. 

Secondly: I have sought to make all the 
schools and teachers in the State understand 
that they and the University are parts of 
one united svstem and that therefore the 
young pupil in the most secluded school 
house in the State should be encouragixl to 
see that the path was open from his home 
up to and through the University. 

The prosperity and usefulness of the 
University are due to the fact that these 
objects have been in a fair degree ac- 
complished. 

Although some State Universities were 
founded before ours, owing to the fact tliat 
the University of Michigan at an earlier 
date than any of the others secured a very 
large attendance in all three of its (le])art- 
ments, its influence in the develoj)ment of 
all the rest has been very great. No small 
portion of my correspondence has been 
devoted to explaining to other univer- 

[255] 



REMINISCENCES OF 

sities our methods and the reasons of our 
comparative success. I have been called to 
expound the principles on which Michigan 
has proceeded in building up its University 
to most of the States which have estab- 
lished their Universities. 

Far be it from me to claim undue credit 
for the success of the Institution. Rather 
do I desire to speak of it with gratitude 
that I have been permitted to be so long 
associated with it in its days of prosperity. 
It has been a singular good fortune to be 
allowed to work with so many excellent 
men in the Board of Regents and in the 
Faculties and to come in touch with so 
many students who have gone forth to 
careers of usefulness in all parts of the 
world. 

The life of the President of a college or 
university is often spoken of as a hard 
and trying life. A laborious life with its 
anxieties it is. But I have found it a 
happy life. The satisfactions it has brought 
to me are quite beyond my deserts. The 
recognition of the value of my services 
w^hich has come to me in these recent 
days from regents, colleagues, graduates, 
and undergraduates humbles me while it 
gratifies me. 

And one acknowledgment I desire above 
[256] 



JAMES B. ANGELL 

all to make. If I have had any success in 
my career, especially in the achninist ration 
of the two universities, it has been hirgcly 
due to the social tact and wise and untiring 
co-operation of my dear wife. 

In January, 1905, though not conscious 
that I had lost my physical or mental 
ability to discharge satisfactorily the duties 
of my office I tendered to the Regents my 
resignation, because I had observed that 
some men on reaching my age were not 
aware of infirmities which in the opinion 
of others disqualified them for continu- 
ing to hold responsible positions. The 
Board in very courteous terms dechned to 
accept it. 

But in February, 1909, having reached 
the age of fourscore, I renewed my request 
to be released under the conviction that 
notwithstanding the good health which had 
been granted to me, it was better for the 
University to call some younger man to my 
place. They kindly acceded to my request, 
asking me to accept the title of President 
Emeritus, to receive a generous salary, and 
to retain my residence in the President's 
house. I cannot be too grateful for what 
they have done to cheer my pathway 
through the remaining years of my life. I 
can thus hope to spend the days allotted 

[257] 

18 



REMINISCENCES OF 

to me near to them, to my beloved col- 
leagues in the Faculties, and to the great 
company of students whose presence has 
long been, and still is, one of my great 
delights. 



THE END 



[258] 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



il III illtlilillilli II I hi llli ii M 
013 787 593 7 



